During a hearing on Thursday, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) shamed FBI agent Peter Strzok for having an extramarital affair.
In an attempt to run interference for President Trump, who benefited from an extramarital affair hush money account during his presidential campaign, Gohmert accused Strzok of lying under oath, and then said: “I can’t help but wonder, when I see you looking there with a little smirk, how many times did you look so innocent into your wife’s eyes and lie to her.”
The room immediately erupted in outraged cries about the “intolerable harassment of the witness.”
Strzok had an affair with another FBI agent, Lisa Page, with whom he shared texts expressing anti-Trump sentiments during the 2016 campaign. The Inspector General recently concluded that Strzok and Page’s anti-Trump texts did not manifest in any biased actions for Clinton or against Trump.
Gohmert’s comments were not the first time Republicans tried to embarrass Strzok during Thursday’s hearing. At one point, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) seemed to take pleasure in forcing Strzok to repeatedly read aloud texts in which he had called Trump a “douche.”
Immediately following Gohmert’s inappropriate line of questioning, Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-VA) said, “Wow. The American public might be forgiven for mistaking this so-called hearing for a Russian political show trial. It has got all trappings — character assassination, demagoguery, connecting dots that aren’t meant to be connected… and cherry-picking facts, sometimes fabricating facts.”
“It is astounding, it’s a new low in the U.S. Congress. What a shame.”