“Kevin McCarthy, I’ll bet you can’t make Louise Mensch’s head explode.”
“Challenge accepted!”— jimgeraghty (@jimgeraghty) May 17, 2017
The Washington Post is out tonight with another bombshell “exclusive”:
EXCLUSIVE House majority leader to colleagues in 2016: ‘I think Putin pays’ Trump https://t.co/cGkuW8OAhR
— Post Politics (@postpolitics) May 17, 2017
Wow. This sounds pretty bad, doesn’t it? More from WaPo:
A month before Donald Trump clinched the Republican nomination, one of his closest allies in Congress — House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy — made a politically explosive assertion in a private conversation on Capitol Hill with his fellow GOP leaders: that Trump could be the beneficiary of payments from Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“There’s two people I think Putin pays: Rohrabacher and Trump,” McCarthy (R-Calif.) said, according to a recording of the June 15, 2016 exchange, which was listened to and verified by The Washington Post. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher is a Californian Republican known in Congress as a fervent defender of Putin and Russia.
House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) immediately interjected, stopping the conversation from further exploring McCarthy’s assertion, and swore the Republicans present to secrecy.
Here’s the thing, though: The transcript tells a somewhat different story:
Here's the WaPo transcript https://t.co/CFrcsu54Tf pic.twitter.com/PdM1KoY9s3
— Farhad Manjoo 🐣 (@fmanjoo) May 17, 2017
[laughter] https://t.co/VeR27hoFEO
— Lachlan Markay (@lachlan) May 17, 2017
That’s a lot of “laughter” for such a serious conversation …
This is true. The assertion was made out of context. Read the transcript, it's clear they were joking https://t.co/978Wbojx7q https://t.co/VnjzYG5vTQ
— Doug Andres (@DougAndres) May 17, 2017
Ryan spokesman Brendan Buck, who was quoted in the article as saying that the conversation “never happened,” took to Twitter to clarify:
Yes, this is dumb. He was just kidding. No one took it seriously. https://t.co/CguAAzid66
— Brendan Buck (@BrendanBuck) May 17, 2017
Goodness, I don’t lie. Period. What was presented to me originally was far different than what they ultimately presented: an obvious joke.
— Brendan Buck (@BrendanBuck) May 17, 2017
I was not originally given quotes – just a crazy assertion that leaders believed Putin was paying Trump and trying to shield it.
— Brendan Buck (@BrendanBuck) May 17, 2017
Seems reasonable.
Ryan's spox initially said the conversation never happened, 100 percent. He didn't change his story until we told him there was a tape https://t.co/w9htnjpgaP
— Adam Entous (@adamentous) May 17, 2017
Gee, maybe he forgot about a jokey exchange filled with laughter, but would have remembered it if McCarthy was being serious? #spitballing https://t.co/vn9QX8UaMd
— Guy Benson (@guypbenson) May 17, 2017
@jackshafer @elianayjohnson @AlexaMRomero Yes, but if someone fed a joke back to me as serious I wouldn’t remember either until I worked out what they were talking about.
— Charles C. W. Cooke (@charlescwcooke) May 17, 2017
The stupid position => he's lying
The not-stupid position => he said "he'd never say that" b/c he knows his boss wouldn't seriously say that— PoliMath (@politicalmath) May 17, 2017
The transcript certainly suggests it was just a joke.
I'm inclined to believe this given the transcript vs. the WP presentation of it https://t.co/FbVnmFLm6h
— Elise Terry (@elisecterry) May 17, 2017
You obviously can't glean tone from a transcript, but this is far more plausible than "McCarthy alleges Putin plot" https://t.co/XKSwGi6VMB pic.twitter.com/UwLQmmQmt8
— Lachlan Markay (@lachlan) May 17, 2017
I mean, guys. There's a lot of laughter in this transcript. https://t.co/kwNBSxhY9O
— Haley Byrd (@byrdinator) May 17, 2017
Irresponsible to write the article without posting audio. Undermines important Trump/Russia reporting. Knowing these lawmakers, it's a joke. https://t.co/6wk2eMjAQc
— Haley Byrd (@byrdinator) May 17, 2017
so they have a recording of his boss making a joke and then he has to roll his eyes "it's a joke you idiots" while they screech pic.twitter.com/dNiJVsF1zP
— PoliMath (@politicalmath) May 17, 2017
To be fair, there are 4 [Laughters] in this one page. @BrendanBuck has every right to claim that they were joking around. https://t.co/uTV8zBng1x
— The Reagan Battalion (@ReaganBattalion) May 17, 2017
There's laughter throughout the whole transcript and people are breathlessly reporting like it was a serious statement
— Woko Haram (@Wokieleaksalt) May 17, 2017
Rep. Rohrbacher has reportedly confirmed that they weren’t being serious:
Caught up with Rep. Rohrabacher, who says McCarthy was joking. Compared it to a joke he once told about farts killing the dinosaurs.
— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) May 17, 2017
Rohrabacher tells me: "I’ve had attempts at humor come back in bite me in the ass as well." https://t.co/cvHx2ho5tM
— Henry J. Gomez (@HenryJGomez) May 17, 2017
Rep. McCarthy has chimed in as well:
This was an attempt at humor gone wrong. No surprise @WashingtonPost tried to contort this into breaking news.
— Kevin McCarthy (@GOPLeader) May 17, 2017
Now, this argument could be made:
All good humor has a tinge of truth. https://t.co/fqPPQxPOaH
— Kevin in ABQ (@KevinInABQ) May 17, 2017
Yes, McCarthy was joking, and the premise of the joke is that Trump is a useful idiot for Russia.
— John McCormack (@McCormackJohn) May 17, 2017
A joke at the expense of Trump. And Rohrabacher. https://t.co/5aqxzxq253
— David Freddoso (@freddoso) May 17, 2017
And assuming Trump gets wind of this article, he may very well fail to see the humor in the conversation:
@lachlan If I were them, I'd be more worried about how POTUS takes it than the WaPo story.
He's been petty and vindictive his entire life.
— Tommy (@formerftt) May 17, 2017
And maybe this wasn’t McCarthy’s finest moment:
good look for the Ryan and McCarthy press shops pic.twitter.com/NFf2i63Fx3
— Tim Alberta (@TimAlberta) May 17, 2017
reminders
1-McCarthy struggles w words
2-This worries colleagues
3-They were gonna make him speaker anyway
4-They still might when Ryan goes pic.twitter.com/b4qYXQImI9— Tim Alberta (@TimAlberta) May 17, 2017
…especially humor about your party's likely nominee for the presidency being on the payroll of a foreign adversary https://t.co/ducqPpfNoQ
— Tim Alberta (@TimAlberta) May 17, 2017
Let's assume McCarthy was joking-probably was-why did Ryan quash it? Because it's a crazy irresponsible thing for MOC to say, joking or not.
— Tim Alberta (@TimAlberta) May 17, 2017
So nah, probably not "explosive" — but reflects immaturity and terrible judgment on the part of one of Washington's most powerful officials https://t.co/uVLN6Eennl
— Tim Alberta (@TimAlberta) May 17, 2017
I feel like it's pretty obvious they're joking, even if it might be inappropriate to joke about this pic.twitter.com/it46ZOk7CH
— Woko Haram (@Wokieleaksalt) May 17, 2017
But still. Do better, WaPo.
I dumb this scandal NothingGate.
Because it's nothing. https://t.co/7pc51B0jH8
— Nathan Wurtzel (@NathanWurtzel) May 17, 2017
At precise moment we need major press to play things as buttoned-up as possible, they're doing shit like this. https://t.co/61OA3RyJI5
— Daniel Foster (@DanFosterType) May 17, 2017
Breathlessly reporting stuff like this is utterly demoralizing to idiots like me praying the major press can help see us through this. https://t.co/CcF5PhYkd1
— Daniel Foster (@DanFosterType) May 17, 2017
Seriously, @washingtonpost. You've established that you're a news leader. Pushing this as villainous isn't leading. It's stupid. https://t.co/BualunFfsd
— Kathleen Smith (@KikkiPlanet) May 17, 2017
Editor’s note: This post has been updated with additional tweets.
