Rep. Jim Jordan is all set to waste more of our tax dollars on another hearing on the so-called "Twitter files," but don't expect him to try to rein in Musk any time soon, or ever.
Jordan made an appearance on CNN's Inside Politics this Sunday, and was asked by host Manu Raju about the courts striking down some of Trump's illegal power grabs, and whether he should take his oversight responsibility seriously.
In response, Jordan basically claimed that King Trump ought to be allowed to do anything he wants before making it perfectly clear that he and his fellow Republicans in the House are not going to be any type of "guardrail" to Trump and Musk's illegal overreach.
RAJU: There's a pattern where judges are saying you're going too far on these issues.
JORDAN: As I said before, we're going to have this, we're going to argue these cases in court. In fact, we filed an amicus brief in the birthright citizenship case, members of Congress, we led an amicus brief on on that issue, so some of the stuff's going to get fired, ironed out in court.
All I know is again Article 2 Section 1, very first sentence, the executive power shall be vested in a president, I think it's important, a president of the United States of America, not in bureaucrats, not in career people, in the president, the guy who put his name on the -- this is a fundamental difference we have with the left. The left thinks, oh, it's the career experts who make the decisions.
That's not how our country works. It's the guy who puts his name on the ballot, get elected, gets elected by we the people. He gets to make the decisions or she gets to make the decisions.
That's how -- we don't want the Faucis of the world and all the people in the bureaucracy making the decisions. We want the guy who put their name, puts their name on the ballot and gets elected by the American people.
RAJU: But you guys are elected too, of course, you know, co-equal branch of government... (crosstalk) ... and I want to ask you about just Elon Musk's role in this, because he clearly has, he has an enormous amount of business before the government, billions of dollars in contracts and the like.
This is what Senator Kevin Cramer, a Republican, a fellow Republican, told me about how they should look after what Elon Musk is doing.
CRAMER: I do think we have to, you know, there have to be guardrails obviously on, on what information he he accesses, but more importantly what he does with it... As a major defense contractor, as a major government contractor, we have, there have to be some some guardrails.
RAJU: So he says, Congressman, that there must be some guardrails on Elon Musk. Do you agree? Should there be at least some guardrails, given that there could be a conflict here?
JORDAN: Well, I think I think the guardrails are you all in the press who are talking about it every day. I mean that's...
RAJU: Well, we don't know what he's doing. He hasn't disclosed anything publicly or his financial access.
JORDAN: All I know is he's an employee, a special employee of the president of the United States, the guy who was elected, as I said. I think the American people appreciate the effort and the work that he's doing.
The fact that he's exposed the ridiculous things that our money is being spent on, I think the American people said, yeah, we sort of always had this suspicion and now we're seeing the evidence.
God bless him for bringing that and frankly, more importantly, God bless him for the work he did in exposing what other journalists, not Republicans, other journalists have called the censorship industrial complex where big government was pressuring big tech to censor Americans largely conservative.
He led, he led the charge with the Twitter files and helping us expose the ridiculous attack on the First Amendment and free speech, and you guys should have been helping us with that. Instead you're attacking Elon.
RAJU: Wait, wait, no, no, I'm sorry, you have oversight responsibility. You're chairman of a very powerful committee. Should you provide some oversight into what Elon Musk is doing here as well?
JORDAN: We provided all kinds of oversight into the attacks on free speech and First Amendment liberties. We're going to continue, In fact, we've got a hearing on Wednesday. We're going to bring in Mr. Taibbi.
RAJU: But you're not, but not on Elon Musk? Not on Elon Musk?
JORDAN: I think the country appreciates what Elon Musk is doing. Our government's taking my tax money and spending it on a trans opera comedy in Ireland? No thank you. Glad you pointed that out, Mr. Musk.
Stop that. Spend our money on something that's effective. And maybe be better if we got rid of the Department of Education and actually had money going to local schools.
At least the teacher in the classroom knows the child's name. Some bureaucrat working remote at the Department of Education here in Washington is really helping kids learn? I don't think so.
RAJU: Well, that's going to be a debate, of course. It sounds like maybe a debate in Congress. We'll see what Trump decides to do on the executive level.
There isn't going to be any "debate" over what Musk is doing if Republicans have their way. They're ready to roll over for him no matter how much damage he and Trump inflict on the American public and the rest of the world, for that matter.
It would also be nice to see one of these reporters debunk the "trans opera comedy in Ireland" lie used to justify what they did to USAID.
From PolitiFact:
Speaking with reporters Feb. 3, Leavitt said USAID gave a grant for "production of a DEI musical in Ireland." That grant came from the State Department, not USAID.
According to USA Spending, the State Department paid $70,000 in 2022 to Ceiliuradh Company Limited by Guarantee "to promote the U.S. and Irish shared values of diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility."
The grant funded a 2022 music festival (not a musical) in 2022 at the U.S. embassy in Ireland, according to Irish news site Gript. The event featured performances from Irish musicians.
Does Jordan think they should defund the entire State Department while they're at it over this?
They're allowing the bull in the china shop to take a wrecking ball to our government and our economy. We'll see how long they can keep pretending what Musk is doing isn't causing real damage to real people's lives.
