Louie Gohmert

Louis Buller "Louie" Gohmert, Jr. (born 1953) is a Republican Representative from Texas (first elected in 2004) and an accomplished idiot. He continues Texas' long, well-deserved reputation of electing eminently stupid people to federal office. He survives by hewing as far right as he can go in an already right-wing state, including jumping on the birther train in 2009[2] and the Tea Party movement in 2010.[3] Despite getting elected year after year, as a representative, nothing he says accomplishes anything beyond wasting time, his proposed bills go nowhere, and his role on every House committee is to be a big dumb waste of space.

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“”People have said to me, ‘Stephen you gotta understand, you don’t even know your history. You’re dumb. You’re dense. You’re a mental midget with the IQ of a butter dish whose mind is a black hole that sucks all surrounding thought into it in an infinite singularity of pure stupidity. Stephen I’m surprised you can even dress yourself. I bet you have to rub peanut butter inside your lips to remember to open your mouth to breathe. I have never met, and I hope to never meet again, a man so pervasively astoundingly unyieldingly ignorant.’ To which I say, 'well then you haven’t met Louie Gohmert.'
—Stephen Colbert[1]

However, he's tolerated by the Tea Party movement[4] because he's a reliable supporter of whatever their political position du jour is, including opposing Obamacare,[5] taxes,[6][7] gun control,[8] the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell,[9] and the American Jobs Act stimulus bill.[10]

What makes Gohmert remarkable isn't his run-of-the-mill Tea Party positions, but rather, that he defends them with alarmist non-sequiturs: Jesus hates taxes![7] Gun control will lead to bestiality![8] The American Jobs Act is an attack on marriage![10] Obama talking to BP about the 2010 oil spill is just like Hitler![11] Foreign aid to China will lead them to sell us food with cats and dogs in it![12] Oil pipelines are good for wildlife![13] Hate crimes legislation leads to necrophilia![14] Etc. Etc.

Why?

Believe it or not, Gohmert used to be a judge. In 2004, he defeated the four-term incumbent, Max Sandlin, in an electoral wipeout—thanks to the new Texas redistricting laws. Gohmert's only comeback for each question in the debate was Well my opponent likes JOHN KERRY... I mean, ha ha ha. He was a douchebag even then.

Terror babies

Gohmert frequently makes what are almost certainly off-the-cuff (albeit dumb) remarks, and when called on them, defends them to the death rather than admit he was wrong.

The best example of this is the "terror babies." Gohmert repeatedly claimed that terrorists were impregnating women, sending them to the US, waiting for the babies to be born as "anchor babies," flying them back to wherever they came from, waiting twenty to thirty years so the babies can grow up and be trained as terrorists, and then sending them back to the US where they can gain easy entry to blow up the country. He first introduced this idea in a speech on the House floor in 2010.

In response, CNN anchor Anderson Cooper interviewed an FBI official on his show to debunk the terror babies claim (Gohmert asserted that the FBI had reported terror baby incidents). Gohmert then appeared on Cooper's show and refused to provide any evidence of terror babies.[15] Xenophobic think tank Center for Immigration Studies attempted to back him up with a report on terror babies, but provided no evidence except for some statistics on illegal immigration and conspiratorial insinuations.[16]

Xenophobic synergy

In a speech delivered to a Longview Chamber of Commerce in Texas, Gohmert voiced his fears that "Radical Islamists" were infiltrating the United States by impersonating Latinos.[17]

Anti-semitism

Apropos of nothing, Gohmert made the following completely false accusations during a Fox Business Network interview, "George Soros is supposed to be Jewish, but you wouldn't know it from the damage he's inflicted on Israel, and the fact that he turned on fellow Jews and helped take the property that they owned. It's the same kind of thing." Gohmert's office doubled down on this slander by subsequently releasing this false statement, "Soros himself admitted in a 60 Minutes interview with Steve Kroft on December 20, 1998, that he had no regrets whatsoever about assisting the Nazis in confiscating property from the Jewish people during the Holocaust. That is a fact."[18]

Same-sex marriage

Gohmert links marriage equality to bestiality and polygamy, gay Boy Scouts to pedophilia, and hate-crimes laws to the end of religious freedom.[19]

Finding terrorists in the tea leaves

Not content to simply insult millions of marginalized people of a darker hue than he, Gohmert also suggested the very respectable, very white senior Senator from Arizona John McCain was a terrorist.[20]

Anti-vaccine quackery

He takes a different line of insanity on the issue than fellow weirdos travelers like Jenny McCarthy or Michele Bachmann; he's opposed to them because liberal elites are culling the Earth's human population through their use in order to preserve natural resources, not because of any false safety concerns drummed up by anti-vax shills. According to Gohmert, this conspiracy is aiming for a target human population of around 700 million people, which would constitute less than ten percent of the estimated current human population.[21]

On school shootings

According to Louie Gohmert, the principal of Sandy Hook should have "had an M4 in her office, locked up so when she heard gunfire, she pulls it out …and takes him out and takes his head off before he can kill those precious kids."[22]

Diplomatic overtures of note

He went to Egypt in September 2013 as part of a Congressional package deal including the likes of Michele Bachmann and Steve King in order to laud the military government for its overthrow of Mohamed Morsi. He wasn't responsible for implying that the Muslim Brotherhood was responsible for 9/11 (that was Bachmann), but he did make the singularly weird comparison of General Abdel Fatah el-Sissi to George Washington.[23]

US History 101

Gohmert disingenuously welcomed the probe into Russian hackers trying to help out the electoral chances of Donald Trump in 2016, but for an odd reason: so that it would also shed light on similar Soviet intervention in the elections of Harry S. Truman, John F. Kennedy and Jimmy Carter.[24] Like the other singularly odd statements he's made on a regular basis in the past, he was apparently quite serious.

Gohmert wastes the legislature's time with frivolous political stunts. In 2020, just after the House approved a measure to remove statues of Confederate soldiers and slaveholders from the US Capitol, he introduced a bill to ban the Democratic Party and any other groups that historically supported the Confederacy or slavery in the United States. This ignorant and reductive legislation was co-sponsored by fellow Republican wingnuts Andy Biggs (R-Arizona), Jody Hice R-Georgia), Andy Harris (R-Maryland) and Randy Weber (R-Texas).[25]

The word "stupid" might not be strong enough, here
“”I think the biggest blockbuster out of (Trump's) press conference with Putin was Putin disclosing that they have evidence that the U.S. intelligence community provided over $400 million to Hillary Clinton for her campaign.
—Louie Gohmert on CBN[26]

According to Gohmert, our good buddies in Russia have “solid evidence that some intelligence officers accompanied and guided these transactions.” The only problem with that assertion is that it's based solely on the word of autocratic sociopath Russian President Vladimir Putin.[27] But he would never lie to anyone for political gain, right?

COVID-19
“”And lastly, don’t be stupid and become the news story of the day.
—Rodney Davis (R-Illinois), commenting on office safety at the US Capitol after Louie Gohmert tested positive for COVID-19[28]

Gohmert refused to wear a mask on Capitol Hill during the 2020 coronavirus pandemic and reportedly told CNN in June, “[I]f I get it, you’ll never see me without a mask.” He tested positive for COVID-19 on July 29, 2020, a day after he appeared before the House Oversight Committee without wearing a mask.[29]

Dumb and dumber
“”There is zero chance that future generations will remember this as anything other than an idiotic and unpatriotic gambit.
—Jonah Goldberg, Boston Herald[30]

In December 2020, Gohmert initiated a last ditch lawsuit targeting Vice President Mike Pence that alleged without any evidence that multiple states illegally changed their voting rules in the 2020 U.S. presidential election, and because of this, Joe Biden's election should be overturned. The lawsuit assumed that the Vice President can determine who won an election regardless of the result. Predictably, this laughable lawsuit was quickly dismissed by a federal judge.[31][32]

gollark: No, dehibernating.
gollark: If it's 10 seconds it sounds like it's just dehibernating.
gollark: VSCode, Terminator, Firefox all work okay for me.
gollark: I've found it fine.
gollark: Doesn't mean you can't care about boot time, Free and Open Source Software, privacy and not-randomly-breaking.

See also

References
  1. Colbert Takes Apart 'History Buff' Louie Gohmert For Remarks About Gay Massage In The Military. crooksandliars.com, 27 October 2014.
  2. Mary Ann Akers. "Birthers, the Few, the Proud, Riling Capitol Hill." The Sleuth, The Washington Post. 2009 July 30.
  3. "Gohmert is a tea party kind of guy. A staple of their rallies, he voted against every stimulus and bailout proposal brought to the House floor when the economy was in a tailspin, making him a fiscal conservative rock star in tea partiers' eyes." —Stephanie Mencimer. "Rep. Louie "Terror Babies" Gohmert: Tea Party Pick for House Leadership." Mother Jones. 2010 December 8.
  4. At least, enough to not lose or be frozen out of the political process.
  5. Sara Kenigsberg. "Obamacare Is Socialism: Reps. Louie Gohmert, Steve King Attack ." Huffington Post. 2012 March 27.
  6. Jed Babbin. "Pay No Tax for Two Months?" Human Events. 2008 December 1.
  7. Pat Garofalo. "Gohmert opposes estate tax extension because 'Jesus never advocated the government go steal.'" Think Progress. 2009 December 3.
  8. Michael Allen. "Rep. Louis Gohmert Compares Gun Control to Bestiality (Audio)." Opposing Views. 2013 April 2.
  9. Nick Wing. "Rep. Louie Gohmert: Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Threatens American 'Existence' (VIDEO)." Huffington Post. 2011 May 25.
  10. Marie Diamond. "Rep. Gohmert Calls Obama’s Jobs Plan An Assault On Marriage That Encourages Divorce." Think Progress. 2011 October 5.
  11. Matt Finkelstein. "Rep. Gohmert Touts Column Comparing Obama To Hitler Over Handling Of BP." Political Correction. Media Matters. 2010 June 23.
  12. Louis Gohmert on the Great Cats and Rare Canids Act of 2009. C-SPAN. 2009 April 21.
  13. Emily Heil. "Louie Gohmert: Best caribou wingman ever." In the Loop, Washington Post. 2012 February 7.
  14. Lee Fang. "Rep. Louie Gohmert: Hate crimes bill will lead to Nazism, legalization of necrophilia, pedophilia, and bestiality." ThinkProgress. 2009 October 7.
  15. Eric Kleefeld. "Anderson Cooper Grills Shouting GOPer Louie Gohmert On 'Terror Babies' Conspiracy (VIDEO)." Talking Points Memo. 2010 August 13.
  16. Adam Serwer. "Terror Babies Go Legit." The American Prospect. 2011 March 16.
  17. David Edwards."Gohmert: ‘Radical Islamists’ taking Spanish lessons ‘because we don’t fear Hispanics’", The Raw Story, Friday, August 9, 2013 9:31 EDT
  18. Rep. Louie Gohmert falsely says George Soros helped take property from fellow Jews by Felicia Sonmez (December 6 at 6:04 PM) The Washington Post.
  19. http://www.advocate.com/politics/2013/12/13/phobie-awards-13-worst-people-year?page=0,10
  20. http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/10/11/louie-gohmert-attacks-john-mccain-for-being-pro-al-qaeda.html
  21. Gohmert: ‘Scary’ that liberal elites would use vaccines for ‘culling the population’ of humans, The Raw Story
  22. Louie Gohmert Says More Guns Are Answer To Preventing Mass Killings
  23. Bachmann, Gohmert and King’s surreal Egyptian presser blames Muslim Brotherhood for 9/11, The Raw Story
  24. Charles P. Pierce, "Let's Take a Dive Down the Wingnut Rabbit Hole", Esquire.com, July 18th, 2018
  25. Daniel Villarreal, GOP Rep Introduced Bill to Ban Democratic Party for Past Support of Slavery. Newsweek, 23 July 2020.
  26. Louie Gohmert Makes a Hash of Putin’s Whopper About Hillary Clinton, Adele M. Stan, Right Wing Watch, July 19th 2018
  27. Natasha Bertrand, "Putin’s Big Tell?", The Atlantic, July 18th, 2018
  28. Anna Palmer, The congressional underclass erupts in fury after Gohmert gets Covid-19. Politico, 30 July 2020.
  29. Louie Gohmert, who refused to wear a mask, tests positive for coronavirus, Jake Sherman, Politico, July 29th 2020
  30. Jonah Goldberg, Lawsuit puts some GOP lawmakers on dumb side of history. Archived from the original at the Boston Herald, 1 January 2021.
  31. Dan Berman, Federal judge throws out Gohmert lawsuit asking Pence to interfere in Electoral College count. CNN, 1 January 2021.
  32. Matthew S. Schwartz and Barbara Campbell, Judge Rejects Last-Minute Claim That Pence Can Ignore States' Presidential Electors. NPR, 1 January 2021.
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