New York Republican Carl Paladino, running for a U.S. House seat, said Attorney General Merrick Garland should probably be "executed" in a radio interview this past weekend, and later when pressed backtracked, claiming he was just being "facetious," as The Buffalo News first reported.
"So we have a couple of unelected people who are running our government with an administration of people like Garland," Paladino said in an attack on President Joe Biden in a Saturday interview with the far-right wing Breitbart media site.
Garland "should be not only impeached he should probably, should be executed, the guy is just lost," Paladino said.
Paladino called Garland, a former U.S. Supreme Court nominee and former Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, a "lost soul" who is "trying to get an image and his image, his methodology is just terrible."
"To raid the home of a former president is just, people are scratching their heads and they're saying, 'What is wrong with this guy?'"
Later in the interview Breitbart Radio host Matthew Boyle asked Paladino, "Carl, what you just said about Garland, you said you think 'he should be impeached and probably executed.' Can you explain that? What do you mean by that?"
"I'm just being facetious," Paladino replied. "The man should be removed from office. He's shows his incompetence. He wants to get his face in front of the people. And in short, he's got some mettle to him, but his choice of issues and his choice of methodology is is is very sad. And then he wants to take full blame for it, you know he'll he'll stand there."
Paladino, who is strongly endorsed by U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), the Chair of the House Republican Conference, has a long history of controversial remarks and actions.
Just last month the New York Post reported he "has a convicted sex offender on his company payroll who also now works as 'assistant treasurer' of his campaign."
"Joel Sartori was controller of Ellicott Development when he was busted in 2013 for accessing child porn on a company computer," The Post adds. "Sartori was convicted of two felonies — possessing and promoting kiddie porn — and sentenced to 10 years’ probation in 2017, court records show."
As CNN has reported, Paladino has called Black people "dumb and hungry," claimed they are "conditioned" to only vote for Democrats, while insisting he’s not "a racist." He also said a woman who had accused Donald Trump of sexual assault "probably enjoyed" it.
Stefanik, the third most powerful House Republican, on June 3 praised Paladino as an “inspirational” leader, a “doer,” and “the kind of leader we need today.” That endorsement came just days before it was revealed Paladino in 2021 had called Adolf Hitler “inspirational,” and “the kind of leader we need today” (audio.)
Stefanik later doubled down on her endorsement despite Paladino’s praise for Hitler, a genocidal fascist responsible for the murders of approximately 17 million people.
As CNN also reported, in 2016, “Paladino had said he would like to see Michelle Obama ‘return to being a male and let loose in the outback of Zimbabwe where she lives comfortably in a cave with Maxie, the gorilla,’ and that he hoped Barack Obama would die of Mad Cow Disease after having sex with a cow.”
Listen to Paladino's remarks about Attorney General Garland below or at this link:
Image: Screenshot via Facebook