'Total baloney?' CNN host sparks testy exchange as he pushes back on GOP rep's claim

A Florida Republican got testy with a CNN anchor who corrected the record on the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

Rep. Carlos Gimenez (R-FL) joined CNN's Boris Sanchez on Friday to discuss the breaking news that the Justice Department handed over a trove of Jeffrey Epstein files to the House Oversight Committee, and separately, that the DOJ has released a transcript and audio of an interview between Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche and former Jeffrey Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell.

Gimenez, a member of the House Armed Services and Homeland Security committees, reacted by saying he wants to find out the truth in the files.

"Who was involved? And then how this deal came about when it came about, you know, some 10, 15 years ago," he said. "Look, what I find interesting, too, is that everybody's trying to do contortions to say that somehow President Trump was involved in this."

He suggested the Biden administration possessed the files for four years and would've implicated Trump if it could have.

"Here they have the big smoking gun, and they won't divulge that? I don't buy it. And so that's why I think there's nothing there concerning Donald Trump," he said.

When Sanchez asked Gimenez how he would "know for sure that DOJ has handed everything over," the congressman called it "speculation."

"Even if they hand everything over and they have nothing more, somebody's going to speculate that there's something there that they're trying to hide because, you know, it's a Republican DOJ. They're going to try to protect President Trump, et cetera, et cetera. And that's going to continue to go on and on and on and on," he said.

Gimenez compared it to the "Russia stuff back in 2017."

"That President Trump was a Russian agent, working with Putin. That turned out to be total baloney. Again, my biggest evidence in this is the fact that these files were under the control of the Biden administration, and nothing ever came out. If that's the case, that, to me, is the greatest evidence that there's absolutely nothing there," he said.

He later urged Republicans to have Alex Acosta, a former Trump administration official, testify in the Epstein case. Acosta has been criticized for giving Epstein a sweetheart deal.

"Because if not, this is just going to drag on forever. We need to get to the bottom of it. We need to put it behind us. You know, President Trump doesn't need this for another 3 1/2 years, like the Russia collusion hoax that lasted throughout his entire presidency. It turned out to be total baloney, a hoax. This is just a distraction, I believe."

Sanchez got testy with Sanchez when the CNN host corrected the record on the Russian meddling investigation.

"I do want to point out that while special counsel Robert Mueller did not find any evidence of collusion, there was a bipartisan consensus that Russia did meddle in the 2016 election. There was electoral meddling," he said.

Before he could continue, Gimenez tried to cut him off.

"Yeah, but that wasn't the case—no, no, hold on a second. The problem wasn't that somehow Russia meddled in the election. The problem was that people were accusing President Trump of somehow being involved," he said.

"And I pointed out that there was no collusion found by the Special Counsel, Robert Mueller," Sanchez shot back. "I just wanted to clarify the point, Congressman. We do appreciate you repeating that. I don't think I said anything to contradict what you said, though. I appreciate your attempt to clarify."

Watch the clip below or at this link.