"Insanity": Democrats tear into Trump for Gaetz and Gabbard nods
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Rep. Matt Gaetz and former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard stepping out of Trump Force One in Philadelphia on Sept. 10, 2024. Photo: Julia Beverly/Getty Images.
Democratic colleagues of Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) were left in disbelief on Wednesday when President-elect Trump nominated both for high-ranking administration roles.
Why it matters: Democrats see a series of increasingly inflammatory and controversial picks coming from the incoming president, and they're using them to build an early case against his administration.
- "These are deeply unserious choices and to the surprise of no one who remembers the first Trump presidency, they signal a lot of chaos and incompetency to come," said Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.).
- "I assumed that Trump's X account had been hacked ... This is insanity," said Rep. Dan Kildee (D-Mich.), adding that there is an "oppo library" on both nominees.
Driving the news: Trump said Wednesday that he is nominating Gabbard as his director of national intelligence and Gaetz as his attorney general.
- Gabbard, a Democrat-turned-Republican who served in Congress from 2013 to 2021, is a staunch anti-interventionist who has criticized U.S. support for Ukraine and defended Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad.
- Gaetz, who has been in Congress since 2017, was the subject of a now-closed Justice Department probe into allegations of child sex trafficking, which he has firmly denied, and is currently under investigation by the House Ethics Committee.
What they're saying: Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, called Gaetz's nomination "probably ... the most questionable of any so far."
- "I think there will be very broad, deep-seated skepticism about his credibility and credentials. It seems like a highly surprising, even bizarre, choice," Blumenthal added.
- Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said Gaetz would be a "disaster as the next Attorney General of the United States."
Zoom in: House Democrats also had little nice to say about either nomination.
- Kildee, a member of House Democratic leadership, told Axios that when he saw news of Gabbard's nomination – which came ahead of Gaetz's – he "thought it was the most outrageous news of the day. How quaint of me."
- Said Rep. Becca Balint (D-Vt.), a House Judiciary Committee member: "I have no words."
Between the lines: There is no love lost between Gabbard and her onetime Democratic colleagues.
- A former Democratic National Committee vice chair who ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020, Gabbard has broken decisively with the party in recent years and aligned closely with Trump.
- Kildee said the split "started a long time ago," and that "her full embrace of Bashar al-Assad was too much for many people to take."
