Once Republicans get going on being awful about something, it always goes downhill fast. The Republican response to the attack on Paul Pelosi was a few tepid statements of sympathy and dismay from top officials but dismissals and mild jokes from the likes of Ronna McDaniel, chairwoman of the RNC, and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin. When powerful Republicans did not send an immediate, unified, unambiguous signal that an attack on the husband of the speaker of the House by an assailant who was looking for the speaker was a bad thing to be condemned quickly and loudly—you knew this was going to get incredibly ugly. And it has.
The vile reactions continue to pour in, and it looks like Fox News in particular is just getting started.
One big talking point is that David DePape, the assailant of the break-in and attack, is a Canadian immigrant who may have overstayed his visa. While Paul Pelosi is still in the hospital, Sen. John Cornyn used the assault as a vehicle for anti-immigrant sentiment, tweeting, “If Paul [sic] Depape has overstayed his visa and was illegally present in US, will Biden administration seek to deport him as part of the consequences of the assault of Paul Pelosi?” Sen. Ted Cruz also joined the “what if he overstayed his visa” crowd with a retweet.
Considering that DePape faces up to 50 years in prison on federal charges and will also face charges from the San Francisco district attorney, deportation may not be a super relevant question, guys, except to the extent that Republicans are always looking to make a big issue of immigration. Which is really the point, isn’t it?
RELATED STORY: Affidavit on charges against Pelosi attacker offers frightening new details
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Cruz also retweeted, with the personal addition of “truth,” far-right podcaster Matt Walsh’s assessment that, “I don’t know what the hell happened at Nancy Pelosi’s house and I suspect none of us will ever know for sure. But I do know that trying to paint a hippie nudist from Berkeley as some kind of militant right winger is absurd and will always be absurd.”
Gosh, I don’t know, Matt/Ted, maybe the vast online footprint filled with Mike Lindell videos and racist, antisemitic, and transphobic content is relevant here in our assessment of whether “nudist from Berkeley” or “militant right winger” is more accurate.
Walsh added, with Cruz’s endorsement, “Being that this is San Francisco, it seems perfectly plausible that some drugged out nut case broke into their home. Trying to turn this San Francisco crime story into an indictment of Republicans is what’s implausible and ridiculous.” By the time this was tweeted and retweeted, we knew that it wasn’t a random “drugged out nut case” break-in—DePape had been yelling “Where is Nancy?”
Since then, in the federal affidavit, we’ve learned that DePape told officers “that he was going to hold Nancy hostage and talk to her. If Nancy were to tell DEPAPE the ‘truth,’ he would let her go, and if she ‘lied,’ he was going to break ‘her kneecaps.’ DEPAPE was certain that Nancy would not have told the ‘truth.’” He targeted Speaker Pelosi because “DEPAPE articulated he viewed Nancy as the ‘leader of the pack’ of lies told by the Democratic Party.”
His right-wing inspiration is not subtle. Nonetheless, Fox News continues inviting its viewers to embrace conspiracy theories about the attack, including this masterpiece of snide insinuation:
Fox & Friends joined in on the "unanswered questions” routine Tuesday morning, Media Matters’ Matt Gertz notes, exploiting confusing early reports—common in any breaking news situation—that have since been corrected or fleshed out. Stuff like reports of Paul Pelosi having described DePape as a “friend” in the 911 call, easily and reasonably explained by the fact that he was trying to talk in code, asking for help without spurring DePape to violence. Republicans also keep suggesting that DePape did not have to break in, even though we know he broke in through a glass door using his hammer. Those are the “questions” Fox News is snidely suggesting reasonable people should be asking.
An 82-year-old man is still in the hospital because someone bought into a pack of right-wing conspiracy theories and targeted his wife for brutality, and Republican politicians and media are turning it into yet another series of attacks. It’s disgusting, and it shows how absolutely devoid of a moral compass these people are.
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