Former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) called Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s (R-Calif.) criticism of the latest charges against former President Trump “complete garbage” Thursday, arguing that his objections don’t “make an ounce of sense.”
“He knows better,” Kinzinger said on CNN, where he now serves as a senior political commentator. Kinzinger, who has broken with McCarthy on various issues related to Trump and served on the House panel that looked into the Jan. 6 riot, was specifically referring the remarks the Speaker made about Democratic presidential candidates and their comments about past elections.
“He knows that’s complete garbage. Even the base would look at that and go, ‘That’s not the same thing.’ It doesn’t make an ounce of sense,” Kinzinger said.
Following Trump’s indictment Tuesday over his efforts to remain in power after losing the 2020 election, McCarthy slammed the Justice Department, claiming that Democrats have previously made similar allegations about elections and have not been charged.
“Were any of them prosecuted? Were any of them put in jail?” McCarthy said at an event in California on Thursday, adding, “When Hillary Clinton said it, nothing happened to her. When they said it in Georgia’s election, nothing happened to them either. You know what, when the [Democratic National Committee] said it, nothing happened to them either.”
Kinzinger said that McCarthy has been getting angry in his public comments recently and suggested that his anger is a result of having to “come up with that lie.”
“It’s very rare for him to get angry when he speaks, but he’s been doing it more and more,” Kinzinger said. “And my guess is, this is tearing him up inside. He’s mad — not at the people who are asking the question — he’s frankly mad that he has to come up with that lie and stand there and say that.”
The former Illinois congressman said after prosecutors unveiled the indictment that he was disappointed Trump is not directly facing charges related to the violence of Jan. 6.
The four-count indictment accuses Trump of engaging in several conspiracies, including a conspiracy to defraud the U.S., a conspiracy to obstruct Congress’s certification of the election Jan. 6 and a conspiracy against the right to vote.