A House Republican was called out for “pure hypocrisy” in a heated exchange on CNN Sunday as a panel accused the Trump administration of “flirting with Nazism.”
Republican Rep. Riley Moore sparred with Democrat Rep. Laura Gillen as the State of the Union panel responded to Vice President J.D. Vance’s speech Friday at a conference in Munich, where he urged Germans not to reject their far-right political parties.
“What J.D. Vance is doing in Germany is really concerning,” Gillen said before criticizing Vance for hosting a meeting with right-wing AfD leader Alice Weidel.
“The Anti-Defamation League has called out [AfD], and J.D. Vance is embracing a group that flirts with Nazism. I’s really, really disturbing,” she continued.
The AfD have been widely accused of racism and xenophobia. One local AfD leader in Eastern Germany has referred to a Holocaust memorial as a “monument of shame” while the party leader Weidel has called for “remigration” of foreign nationals in Germany
Moore, who was rattled by Gillen’s remarks, rejected her claim that the Trump administration may be supporting Nazism.
“I’m sorry he’s not flirting with Nazism,” he said. “What he’s talking about here, what Vice President Vance is talking about, is the censorship and the manipulation of elections that have been happening in Europe.”
“It’s been happening on this side of the pond. He is correct.”
CNN host Dana Bash had asked the panel earlier its views views on the recent blacklisting of Associated Press journalists from an Oval Office event after the news agency ignored an executive order to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America.
But as Moore made the case for free speech, Bash saw an opportunity to challenge his apparent double standards and brought the discussion back to the topic.
“Should [the Trump administration] let the Associated Press back in the White House?” Bash asked Moore.
“The president can make the call of whoever he would like to have sit in those chairs,” he replied. “That’s not censorship.”
It was at this moment that tensions flared in the CNN studio.
“It’s pure hypocrisy,” Gillen interrupted. “And let’s not forget that [AfD] is a party that’s been boosted by Elon Musk. So he’s helping Elon Musk do regime change in Germany.”
In the same segment, fellow CNN panelist and Republican supporter Kristen Soltis Anderson predicted tha Vance was destined to become the next GOP nominee for president.
