Kevin McCarthy bashed for letting Matt Gaetz run an 'abomination' of a Jan. 6 hearing

At the same time that Donald Trump was being arraigned in a Florida courtroom on a 37-count federal indictment alleging conspiracy and violations of the Espionage Act, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) allowed Rep. Matt Gaetz to use a room in the Capitol complex to hold a sham hearing on the Jan. 6 insurrection which was carried live by C-SPAN.

As the Washington Post's Dana Milbank pointed out, while the Florida lawmaker called his stunt a "field hearing," he holds no committee chairmanship position in GOP-led House and McCarthy should have squashed his plans.

Add to that, Gaetz's "hearing," which was attended by Reps. Lauren Boebert (R-CO), Paul Gosar (R-AZ), Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Ralph Norman (R-SC), was designed to portray the Jan. 6 rioters in a positive light despite their attempts at an insurrection designed to subvert the will of the voters.

As Milbank wrote, Gaetz's make-believe committee adopted all the trappings of a legitimately empaneled committee.

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"Technically, Gaetz couldn’t call such a hearing, because he isn’t a committee chairman. But House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who is trying to win back the support of extremists such as Gaetz, let it happen anyway," he wrote in his Washington Post column before adding, "Gaetz did his all to make the proceedings look official. There were congressional seals on his nameplate and on the big screen behind him. A meeting room in the Capitol visitor center was arranged to appear like a committee room, with lawmakers facing the witnesses."

What followed was an attack on the FBI and the Justice Department, with the columnist reporting, "From the witness table came howls of 'wrongful conviction' and 'fascism.' From the dais came a cry of 'tyranny.' From both came attacks on judges, juries and prosecutors. Audience members were wearing T-shirts saying rioters had been 'murdered by Capitol police.' In the hallway, keeping the peace, were two Capitol Police officers, guarding the people accusing them of murder."

Noting that Gaetz boasted to the attendees and a national television audience that the testimony delivered by supporters of the former president would be used “for the official record [of the] House” or for “work in the Judiciary Committee, upon which I serve, or the Oversight Committee,” Millbank called out "The feckless House Republican leaders who let this week’s abomination occur."

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