In March 2021, The New York Times described Sen. Ron Johnson as “the Republican Party’s foremost amplifier of conspiracy theories and disinformation.” It’s been discouraging to see the Wisconsin senator spend the three years that followed proving the criticism true.
A month ago, for example, Johnson appeared on Fox News to talk about the assassination attempt that targeted Donald Trump. “I’ve seen some pretty interesting video on the internet by experts that certainly calls into question what the FBI is telling us about a single shooter,” the GOP lawmaker said, apparently indifferent to the fact that those discredited videos were spread by fringe conspiracy theorists.
A month later, Johnson again spoke to Fox Business’ Maria Bartiromo, and as The Independent noted, the Wisconsin Republican shared some similarly weird thoughts.
Republican Senator Ron Johnson attacked Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz over his ties to China, claiming it’s a red flag that the “radical leftist” got married “on the anniversary of Tiananmen Square.”
No, seriously. Johnson — a man Senate Republicans put in charge of the Senate Homeland Security Committee for six years — told a national television audience with a straight face, “It’s very strange. [Walz] got married on the anniversary of Tiananmen Square. He’s gone to China. He’s taught in China. He’s got deep connections to China.”
Hours later, House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer appeared on Fox News and suggested that it’s “very possible” that China has been “grooming” Walz for decades.
Chris Lehmann’s latest piece for The Nation made the case that too many Republicans “have a bad case of Walz Derangement Syndrome,” and lawmakers like Johnson and Comer are helping prove the point.
I am, of course, mindful of the broader circumstances. After Vice President Kamala Harris tapped the Minnesota governor for the Democrats’ 2024 ticket, the race was on in GOP circles to define a man who was largely unknown to a national audience. But Republican efforts have become so utterly ridiculous that they’re literally unbelievable. The smear of Walz’ military service was ugly and wrong; the Somali flag story was idiotic; the tampons story was worse; and practically every other line of attack the GOP has come up with has proved to be false or exaggerated. And that apparently led Johnson and Comer to start pushing weird rhetoric about the governor and China. The question for voters is straightforward: If the Democratic vice presidential nominee is so awful, why are his Republican critics stuck peddling nonsense?
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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