On this date in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, as well as 2020, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published profiles of U.S. Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma, a man who cites the Bible as the evidence he needs to refute climate change (even contradicting Pope Francis’ stance on the issue based on his Bible stance, which the Pope is kind of also an expert on), which he does with a passion beyond possibly any other Republican in Congress, most famously in the still frame above from C-SPAN, where he presented a snowball in Washington, D.C. in February as indisputable proof. He also criticized President Obama for attending the Paris climate change accords because climate change science “ignores God’s power”. Inhofe once declared 9-11 was “God’s Judgment on the American people for not doing enough to help Israel”.
Inhofe’s also pridefully bragged about his dedication to discrimination over his refusal to have ever employed a single gay staffer in his entire Congressional career, and boasted how there are no gay people amongst any of his 11 children or 47 grandchildren on the floor of the Senate, and in 2016, took to the floor of the Senate to condemn he idea of transgendered citizens being allowed to use the public bathroom of their choice, saying it was a “liberal agenda being crammed down the neck of Oklahoma” .
Sen. Inhofe also expressed his outrage in 2004 when the photos of American soldiers abusing detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison leaked to the public, because he thought everyone was making a fuss over people who deserved what they were getting. Inhofe not only once participated in a Republican filibuster of a bill from New York Senator Kristen Gillibrand that was aimed at preventing military sexual assault, but on the anniversary of that filibuster, he single-handedly moved to block her from bringing the bill to the floor for another vote.
He has claimed there are no instances of fracking ever contaminating groundwater, anywhere. Inhofe claimed that “the culture of sanctuary cities” were the real cause of the mass shooting in Las Vegas in 2017, rather than lax gun control laws. Oh, and rounding things out, James Inhofe voted against relief funding for Hurricane Sandy, which is rather hypocritical considering how much he falls all over himself to get disaster relief funding whenever any part of Oklahoma gets hit by a tornado (which is pretty frequent).
During the Trump administration, Sen. Inhofe voted to confirm every member of Donald Trump’s Cabinet of horrors, attempted to repeal the Affordable Care Act and leave 23 million Americans without health insurance, and voted to confirm Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court, something he’d been keen on doing since immediately commenting on delaying the vote before Antonin Scalia’s body was even cold. He put Brett Kavanaugh on there as well, ignoring that Kavanaugh perjured himself multiple times during his confirmation hearings, as well as his first confirmation hearing to become a federal judge… and then helped push Amy Coney Barrett onto the SCOTUS in the fastest confirmation in modern history.
We’ll add that not long after the death of Sen. John McCain, when the White House bizarrely took its flag down from half-mast ahead of every other institution in Washington, Sen. Inhofe blamed the breach of protocol not on a grudge Donald Trump had with McCain… but on the deceased Arizona Senator. That may have been because the entire time McCain was battling cancer, Inhofe was chomping at the bit to take his place as the head of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Maybe that has something to do with the fact that he also just bought stock in the military contractor Raytheon in the past few years, which is a HUGE conflict of interest for someone who, you know, uses his position in the Senate to decide what companies get tax dollars for their military equipment. That’s why it should come as little surprise that he would claim a general at the Pentagon told him we should not withdraw all American forces from Afghanistan… how is Sen. Inhofe supposed to profit on war without one actively going on?
James Inhofe is now 87 years old, and won re-election in 2020 that will theoretically keep him in office until he is 92.
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Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day: James Inhofe- 2021 Update
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