Yesterday on “Washington Watch,” Rep. Louie Gohmert railed against “the hate crimes by this administration” against conservative Christians, such as the nuns of the Little Sisters of the Poor.
The Texas Republican and radio host Tony Perkins, the president of the Family Research Council, falsely claimed that the Obama administration refuses to offer religious groups an exemption from the Affordable Care Act’s contraception coverage requirement.
In fact, the Little Sisters of the Poor is covered under its accommodation but refuses to fill out the form seeking an exemption.
Gohmert said that instead of focusing on America’s enemies, “they just choose to spend a great deal of their time going after Christians.”
“We’ve never had a religion permit the kinds of hate crimes that this administration is in going after them and bullying them,” he added, claiming that the administration’s “bullying” is “the worst in our history.”
After alleging that the ACA has “been used as a government tool to go after Christians and those whose religious beliefs are different from the president’s,” Gohmert went on to make the baseless claim that the White House tried to cut off aid to Ethiopia, Kenya and Nigeria until they legalized same-sex marriage. “This administration hasn’t confined their bullying just to this country,” he said.
Gohmert should not be considered an expert on hate crimes, as he once said the hate crimes law passed in 2009 would legalize pedophilia, necrophilia and bestiality while ushering in Nazism.
The two also blasted an Obama administration effort to fight hate crimes directed at Muslim-Americans. Gohmert dismissed concerns about such hate crimes while saying that the White House is ignoring crimes against Christians and Jews throughout the world because “we have a United States leadership that will not protect Christians [and] puts a real prize on protecting Muslims.”
He said that Muslim people should be more grateful to U.S. service members fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, claiming that the U.S. has only gotten terrorist attacks in return.
“It is absolute insanity that this administration continues to do great harm and persecute Christians for their religious beliefs,” Gohmert continued.
The congressman then quoted from the book of Hosea to suggest that America is facing God’s wrath because “nations are made to account when they put leaders in place that persecute those who are trying to follow the words of God.”
Perkins, for his part, said that Obama is only promoting religious liberty for Muslims. (In the past, Perkins has repeatedly said that Muslims are not protected under the First Amendment).
