On Sunday, Republican Congressman Trey Gowdy of South Carolina shut down Face the Nation moderator Margaret Brennan when she implied that he was partially responsible for the current disunity in Washington.
The Congressman appeared on the show in tandem with Senator and fellow South Carolinian Tim Scott to discuss a book they had had co-authored, entitled Unified: How Our Unlikely Friendship Gives Us Hope for a Divided Country. Brennan attempted to frame the Gowdy’s calls for unity as hypocritical in light of his participation in what she described as “divisive” House investigations:
A lot of people in Washington, when they hear that you are issuing a call for unity, will say, he’s been associated with two of the most divisive, politically heated probes in Washington: the probe into what happened in Benghazi, and the most recent House Intelligence probe into Russian election meddling.
“How do you reconcile those things?” she smirked. Gowdy attacked the premise that the role he had played in the these admittedly controversial hearings had in any way exacerbated their innate divisiveness:
I hear about divisiveness, just not from my colleagues. I hear a lot about it a lot from people in your line of work, how divisive I am. And yet I don’t have a fractured relationship with a single, solitary Democrat that serves in the House. Conflict sells. It is much more commercially appealable to refer to something as hyper-partisan or deeply divisive.
Brennan offered no counterpoint to these accusations, and remained silent as Gowdy continued to point out the flaws in her misrepresentation of him.
The Congressman then delved into his role as chairman of the committee that investigated the Benghazi fiasco, pointing out the liberal media’s misleading portrayal of the probe as a congressional referendum on then-Secretary of State Clinton’s character: “I was not hyper-focused on Secretary Clinton. Lots of other people were, including people — with respect — in your line of work.”
“Out of all the hearings we had, zero were about her e-mail,” he continued. “And yet that’s the narrative that’s imprinted.” Senator Scott jumped in to corroborate Gowdy’s take. “The one thing that Trey tried to do in both situations was go after the truth, not after Hillary Clinton,” he explained.
Her narrative now thoroughly quashed, Brennan dropped the subject and brought focus of the conversation back to the legislators’ book.
