James Comer's A-Squealin' Like A Piggy Over Democrats Going To El Salvador
Hee haw!
A handful of House Democrats flew to El Salvador on Monday in the hope they can put more pressure on the White House to bring back Kilmar Abrego Garcia and the 200-something other people the Trump administration illegally shipped off to serve as slave labor in a notorious prison for terrorists. This trip is not an official congressional delegation visit, or CODEL, but just four congressional reps who see advocacy for this injustice as part of their mission as elected leaders and humanitarians.
The trip would be a CODEL, which would mean the Dems could receive funding and security for it from Congress, but it is not a CODEL because James Comer, Republican chairman of the House Oversight Committee to which all these representatives belong, is a banjo-strummin', straw-chewin’, moonshine-brewin’, Kentucky fried garden gnome. Also an asshole.
And that’s us being nice.
Seriously, the Dems — Robert Garcia, Maxwell Frost, Yassamin Ansari and Maxine Dexter — requested Comer make their trip an official CODEL. Comer said no, and he did it in the most dickish letter we’ve probably ever seen on congressional letterhead, which we’ll reprint in full here because Jesus Christ:
Dear Representatives Garcia and Frost:
I write in response to your letter of April 15, 2025 requesting that I approve, from the Committee's budget, official travel for you both to visit the country of El Salvador to meet with a foreign MS-13 gang member whose wife accused him of crimes and who is strongly suspected of human trafficking. It is absurd that you both displayed active hostility for over two years toward the Committee's oversight of the Biden Border Crisis and the consequences of millions of illegal aliens entering the country, yet now, you are seeking travel at Committee expense to meet with foreign gang members. You may be pleased to know that a Democrat Senator, Chris Van Hollen, was photographed just yesterday in El Salvador enjoying margaritas garnished with cherry slices with the foreign gang member your letter references. If you also wish to meet with him, you can spend your own money. But I will not approve a single dime of taxpayer funds for use on the excursion you have requested.
Your request is denied.
Sincerely,
James Comer
The bit about the margaritas is a nice touch, since Van Hollen has publicly stated those glasses were empty and were placed on the table by an aide to Nayib Bukele so El Salvador’s president could shitpost on X about how well he’s treating Garcia.
We’re assuming Comer didn’t go to church on Easter, because surely we would have heard reports of him bursting into flames the second he entered the sanctuary.
What a grandstanding asshole. About what you’d expect from a good ol’ small-town bank president punching well above his weight.
The Democrats went to El Salvador anyway, because as Frost said, he doesn’t need Comer’s permission to get on a plane. The trip is just maybe a bit harder to arrange, and of course there is less security, but what does Comer care if the group is in danger, they’re just Democrats.
It’s not as if Comer has a moral objection to using the prisoners at Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo (CECOT) for a photo op, because a) he has no morals, and b) see a. It’s just that if you want to use CECOT for political purposes, it needs to be in a way that showcases your callous indifference to the fact that the Trump administration illegally sent people to be imprisoned there.
Did Comer have any principled objections to Stupid Kristina Söderbaum — otherwise known as Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem — flying down to El Salvador, with her $50,000 Rolex and her artfully arranged blowout and her collagen-enhanced lips puffing up like she just got stung by a bee, to use a bunch of CECOT prisoners as props for what amounted to a campaign ad?
And was Comer upset last week when a bunch of Republicans took their own CODEL to the prison so a couple of them could pose for photographs, including one in which Rep. Riley Moore, a freshman from West Virginia, gave the camera the old Donald Trump thumbs-up in front of a large cell stuffed with prisoners? Hell no, he’s probably spent the last week pulling his pud over the sight.
But go to the prison to highlight the legal depredations of the Trump administration in using it to house what amounts to political prisoners? Nah.
Meanwhile, Bukele on Sunday suggested a deal with Venezuela that would get these pesky prisoners out of his country. We can’t imagine he’s tired of the attention and gratitude from America’s conservatives, so he’s either trolling or ... OK, probably just trolling. But it’s still worrisome.
Bukele made the offer in a post on X (no link because fuck Elon Musk) that he addressed to Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro. In it, he offered to trade all the prisoners sent from America for a whole bunch of political prisoners Venezuela is holding, plus a fifth-round pick and a player to be named later:
Unlike our detainees, many of whom have committed murder, others have committed rape, and some have even been arrested multiple times before being deported, your political prisoners have committed no crime. The only reason they are imprisoned is because they opposed you and your electoral fraud.
Yr Wonkette has news for Bukele: the Venezuelans he’s holding are also political prisoners. As Marisa Kabas noted, at first the Salvadoran president was not going to let Sen. Chris Van Hollen into CECOT a day or two after letting in that CODEL of Republicans. If you're a Republican who wants to fly down and gawk and post pictures of yourself in front of a cell full of scary brown people, that’s propaganda for the White House that puts the lie to the idea that whole thing is about legal justice.
It’s also unclear that Bukele could carry out such an offer, since he’s being paid by America to hold these guys for at least a year. But we’re guessing the Trump administration wouldn’t complain if Bukele sent these guys farther south, so long as the check has cleared.
[BlueSky / The Handbasket / NYT]
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Pig-ignorant, traitorous fuckwit sez whut?
I have known banjo-strummin', straw-chewin’, moonshine-brewin’, Kentucky fried garden gnome's. Some banjo-strummin', straw-chewin’, moonshine-brewin’, Kentucky fried garden gnome's were frends of mine. You Mr.Comer are no banjo-strummin', straw-chewin’, moonshine-brewin’, Kentucky fried garden gnome.