CNN Commentator likens GOP lawmakers to a ‘Klan group’ for disrupting impeachment hearings because all were ‘white men going in defense of a white man’
- CNN commentator Keith Boykin commented on the right-wing Republicans who crashed the House impeachment hearings on Wednesday
- Boykin said it was a ‘disgraceful stunt. This looked like a Klan group,’ because the lawmakers were almost ‘all white men’ defending Trump, also a ‘white man’
- Appearing on The Lead with Jake Tapper, Boykin, a progressive, said Trump was ‘by most accounts a racist’ who was ‘abusing his powers as president
- Tapper said the metaphor was ‘a little strong’ coming after Trump’s controversial tweet comparing the hearings to a ‘lynching’
- Boykin responded that he understood, and that his comment, which was a reference to the Ku Klux Klan, was on purpose
Republicans lawmakers who stormed this week’s House impeachment hearings were likened to the Ku Klux Klan by a CNN commentator because most were ‘white men’ coming in defense of President Donald Trump, who is also white.
Progressive Keith Boykin on Thursday’s broadcast of The Lead with Jake Tapper said the disruption was a ‘disgraceful stunt.’
‘This looked like a Klan group assembled outside of a jail trying to get the sheriff to let them in so they could deliver their own justice against somebody who was inside’ he said, commenting on the disruption a day earlier.
Progressive Keith Boykin (pictured) on Thursday’s broadcast of The Lead with Jake Tapper said Republicans who had stormed the House’s impeachment proceedings had not cause just a disruption, but staged what he considered was a ‘disgraceful stunt’
‘This looked like a Klan group assembled outside of a jail trying to get the sheriff to let them in so they could deliver their own justice against somebody who was inside’ Boykin commented about the GOP impeachment hearing crashers (pictured)
‘It’s not a good look for our democracy. It’s not a good look for the Republican Party,’ he added. ‘Republicans are already on these committees that are in this impeachment investigation’.
Boykin echoed the sentiments of other progressives, including Democratic Socialist Alexander Ocasio-Cortez, who pointed out there was bipartisan representation within the hearings launched into the possible impeachment of President Trump.
Twenty right-wing House members had disrupted a Democrat-led meeting Wednesday, and prevented a Pentagon official from giving a deposition in the ongoing impeachment probe.
Republican Representative from Florida Matt Gaetz (pictured) was among twenty right-wing House members who disrupted a Democrat-led meeting Wednesday, and prevented a Pentagon official from giving a deposition in the ongoing impeachment probe
President Trump (pictured) is alleged to have known in advance that his fellow Republicans were going to storm the impeachment hearings
President Trump sent thanks to the lawmakers in a tweet that also compared the hearings to a ‘lynching,’ drawing fire from critics for the reference to a word used to describe the hangings of black people in the South during the last 1800s and early 1900s
The GOP agitators had pushed past guards and barged in with cellphones, which are forbidden in ‘SCIFs’ where members routinely review sensitive intelligence. US Capitol Police and the Sergeant-at-Arms had to be called, and officers eventually were able to clear the room.
President Trump, who is alleged to have known his fellow Republicans were going to storm the hearing, sent thanks to the lawmakers in a tweet that also compared the hearings to a ‘lynching,’ drawing fire from critics for the reference to a word used to describe the hangings of black people in the South during the last 1800s and early 1900s.
It was Trump’s controversial ‘lynching’ same reference that prompted CNN host Jake Tapper (above center) to warn Boykin (far right) that his own comments using the Klan reference was ‘a little strong’
It was that same reference that prompted Tapper to warn Boykin that his own comments using the Klan reference was ‘a little strong’.
‘I don’t want to get into a whole thing but earlier this week we were talking about lynching and using that word lightly. I’m not going to debate the history — ‘ the host stated.
Boykin responded that he understood, and that he deliberately made the reference.
‘I used it purposely,’ he said, explaining that he believed the image of the lawmakers coming in defense of the president was a ‘visual problem too.’
‘To have this group of almost all white men going in, in defense of the white man who already is, I think, by most accounts a racist’, Boykin told Tapper.
The commentator suggested the lawmakers should be focused on Trump ‘abusing his powers as of the president of the United States’.