On the eve of Friday’s open impeachment hearing featuring former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, Fox News host Sean Hannity suggested Yovanovitch may look to create more drama by crying “on cue” throughout the proceedings.
During his show-opening monologue on Thursday, Hannity once again took aim at Yovanovitch over her testimony last month that she was told someone at the State Department “would place a call to Mr. Hannity” to get to the bottom of media attacks against her last spring.
Yovanovitch, prior to being removed from her post, was targeted by Donald Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani and others after conservative columnist John Solomon reported a claim by former top Ukrainian prosecutor Yuriy Lutsenko that Yovanovitch gave him a “do not prosecute” list. Lutsenko has since retracted that claim.
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“Well, you remember, she’s the one that suggested that yours truly somehow played a role in her dismissal,” Hannity declared. “I will remind her that is a lie and a complete fabrication.”
The pro-Trump host went on to insist that his show only mentioned her name “in passing” and in “one report,” all while warning Yovanovitch and others that he might sue them if they don’t “stop spreading bogus rumors and smears about” him.
“Stop the hearsay,” Hannity exclaimed right before he decided to spread some hearsay.
“By the way, one other point on this,” the conservative primetime star huffed. “I would say apparently she cried and the Democrats are apparently hoping she will cry again tomorrow. OK. Does that mean like on cue?”
Hannity isn’t the only right-wing media figure to push the misogynistic notion that a female diplomat might purposely turn on the waterworks to sway lawmakers and viewers at home.
During a broadcast earlier this week, conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh said Democrats are having Yovanovitch testify early in the open hearings because “it’s said she cried during her deposition” and “they want somebody in tears under oath describing what Trump has done.”
The Federalist’s Sean Davis, meanwhile, took to Twitter to tell his followers not to “be surprised if Yovanovitch, who was fired in May, pulls a [Christine] Blasey Ford and cries on camera for effect.”
