When Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court hearing began, Lindsey Graham made a big show of swearing it “won’t be a circus.” It has been, in part thanks to him. While Ted Cruz has repeatedly proven a nuisance and Marsha Blackburn asked her bizarre questions, it’s Graham who’s made the most dramatic displays. Indeed, on Wednesday, he threw a fit and stormed out of the room — for a second time.
On Tuesday, Graham made a big show of fleeing the room — and running up to reporters with snippy complaints — after getting into a tiff with Dick Durbin. During his second go with President Joe Biden’s pick for the Supreme Court, Graham moaned again about the 2017 hearing for Brett Kavanaugh, which proved controversial as he was credibly accused of sexual abuse.
"Senator, I'm not sure, I don't understand the context of the question" — Judge Jackson to Lindsey Graham as he tries to craft another clip for Hannity by whining about Kavanaugh
"Senator, she's had nothing to do with the Kavanaugh hearing," Durbin interjects pic.twitter.com/BFeeNJHWFe
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 23, 2022
He also seized upon a talking point debunked by no less than the deeply conservative The National Review: the claim that her sentencing of child porn cases was lenient, when it was actually in keeping with the norm.
Graham, like Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz, suggested Jackson went light on those who’d viewed child pornography. “If you’re listening to my voice today and you’re on a computer looking at child pornography and you get caught,” he railed, “I hope your sentence is enhanced because the computer and the internet is feeding the beast her.”
"If you're listening to my voice today and you're on a computer looking at child pornography … " — Lindsey Graham pic.twitter.com/kMUpLFfr7M
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 23, 2022
As he heatedly grilled Jackson, Graham went over his allotted ten-minute window. He refused to let her answer and when she tried he cut her off. Finally, a pissy Graham made some heinous and inaccurate intimations.
“All I can say is that your view on how to deter child pornography is not my view,” Graham seethed. “I think you are doing it wrong and every judge who does what you‘re are doing is making it easier for the children to be exploited. If you are on a computer looking at a kid in a sexually compromising situation and you get caught I hope no one gives you a break because you used a computer.”
Then he split.
Yes, Yes he did.
Here's Lindsey Graham ONCE AGAIN storming out of the room, this time after Dick Durbin calls him "reprehensible" over his browbeating Q&A session with Ketanji Brown Jackson. https://t.co/KqYvncbpRC pic.twitter.com/tn26lRLRm1
— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) March 23, 2022
Then again, maybe you’d be mad, too, if you knew the only way to appease your increasingly bonkers base was to come after a woman you helped appoint to the federal bench not once but twice.
(Via The Daily Beast)