Republican lawmaker Paul Gosar censured for anime video depicting him killing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
- Trump ally Paul Gosar had tweeted an altered animation that depicted him striking Democrat congresswoman with a sword
- The censure, a formal rebuke, is the first such action against a House member in more than a decade
Far right congressman Paul Gosar was forced to endure a public shaming on Wednesday as he was called to present himself in the “well” of the lower chamber for the “pronouncement of the censure”.
The Arizona Republican was made to listen in silence as Democrats spent more than an hour rebuking him for what they called workplace harassment and encouraging violence against women.
“We cannot have members joking about murdering each other or threatening the president of the United States,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said before the censure.
“This is both an endangerment of our elected officials and an insult to the institution of the House of Representatives.”
A censure resolution is the most severe form of punishment in the House and just a handful of members have faced the sanction over the last century – most recently 11 years ago.
Gosar also joined fellow Trumpist agitator Marjorie Taylor Greene as the second House Republican to lose their position on House committees this year.
An outspoken ally of Donald Trump who echoes the former president’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen, Gosar has been condemned for his associations with white nationalists and his praise for the rioters who stormed the US Capitol on January 6.
He was rebuked anew after tweeting out a video in the Japanese anime style showing him fatally slashing the neck of New York Democrat congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez before attacking Biden with a sword.
It was an altered version of the opening credits of the Japanese television series Attack on Titan.
Gosar removed the video – which received millions of views – after a backlash but has not expressed any regret in public or apologised to his targets.
Gosar retweeted it on Wednesday evening following the censure.
In a defiant speech before lawmakers, Gosar argued that he was the victim of censorship, absurdly comparing himself to Founding Father Alexander Hamilton, who was the target of a failed censure vote in the late 18th century.
He denied that the video represented a threat of violence, arguing that he was trying to start a conversation about illegal immigration.
He did not explain why a video about undocumented migrants would single out Ocasio-Cortez, a third generation New Yorker and a lifelong American citizen with roots in Puerto Rico, a US territory.
Opposition lawmakers have complained that there should have been an ethics investigation before any punishment was meted out, and only two out of 213 voted to hold Gosar to account.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy played down the conspiracy theorist’s behaviour, and suggested Democrats should be concentrating on addressing inflation rather than bringing Gosar to account.
He accused the majority party of double standards over their softer handling of congresswomen Maxine Waters and Ilhan Omar, who have both been criticised for inflammatory language.
“They’re destroying this institution, silencing the minority, and therefore silencing millions of Americans,” he said.
Ocasio-Cortez accused McCarthy of displaying a nihilistic contempt for the work of the House.
“It is a sad day in which a member who leads a political party in the United States of America cannot bring themselves to say that issuing a depiction of murdering a member of Congress is wrong and instead decides to venture off into a tangent about gas prices and inflation,” she said.
“What is so hard what is so hard about saying that this is wrong?”
Reuters, Agence France-Presse, Bloomberg
