Even if Matt Gaetz had never once opened his mouth to speak over the past decade-plus he has been in politics, it would be clear from the product-filled ocean wave of hair crashing atop his head that whatever the Florida congressman had to say would likely be tone-deaf and offensive. Unfortunately, he has not chosen to remain silent and we’re all too familiar with his inane opinions on everything from life-threatening illnesses like diabetes (“lose weight!”) and COVID to why acquitted serial killer Kyle Rittenhouse would make a great congressional intern. On Wednesday, Gaetz made a giant horse’s ass of himself yet again for all the world to witness—and Seth Meyers, for one, is here for it!
On Wednesday, Gaetz—who is under federal investigation for sex trafficking—made a big show of trying to show up four-star general and U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin while reviewing the DoD’s proposed 2023 defense budget. The interaction did not go well for the Florida Man, who seemed to lack a basic understanding of how military spending works but had a whole lot of thoughts on “wokeism.”
Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL): “You guys said that Russia would overrun Ukraine in 36 days.”
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin: “Has it occurred to you that Russia has not overrun Ukraine because of what we’ve done? And our allies have done? Have you ever even thought about that?” pic.twitter.com/Wigdb37aSg
— The Recount (@therecount) April 5, 2022
As Meyers explained:
“Florida congressman Matt Gaetz, who looks like he wished on a monkey’s paw he’d make it in Major League Baseball and instead got Mr. Met’s head, leveled a bunch of unhinged conspiracy theories at Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin yesterday, claiming the military cares more about critical race theory and ‘wokeism’ than National Defense…
“What is wrong with these people? In their fevered swamp brains, do they genuinely believe our soldiers no longer know how to file a rifle because they are buried in homework from pronoun class?”
Meyers went on to point out that while he encourages that tough questions be asked of our national security officials, and generally agrees that the defense budget is “massively inflated,” that’s not even what Gaetz was attempting to do by taking a hard-line stance with Austin. That stance, of course, started to crumble when the congressman began yelling about being “behind in hypersonics,” an advanced type of weaponry that can travel at more than five times the speed of sound.
When Austin questioned Gaetz’s understanding of hypersonic weapons, and how he came to determine that we’re “behind” on them, Gaetz simply uttered: “I don’t know.” Which, yep, that sounds about right.
You can watch the full clip above.