Representative Tulsi Gabbard (D., Hawaii) continued to lash out at Hillary Clinton on Tuesday following the former presidential candidate’s insinuation that Gabbard’s presidential policy platform was based on advancing Russian interests.
“I think they’ve got their eye on someone who’s currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate,” Clinton said on the Campaign HQ podcast in October. According to Clinton, Gabbard was “the favorite of the Russians. They have a bunch of sites and bots and other ways of supporting her so far.”
When asked about the comments, Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill seemed to confirm that she was referring to the Russians when he said “if the nesting doll fits.” But Clinton later backtracked and insisted she was referring to Republicans, not the Russians, as “grooming” Gabbard.
Speaking Tuesday with stand-up comedian Joe Rogan on “The Joe Rogan Experience,” Gabbard and her host both criticized Clinton for her comments.
“When you look at the media establishment pushing a lot of the same narrative and a lot of the same message, then you can see how someone gets away with calling a sitting member of Congress, a candidate for president, a soldier actively serving in the National Guard, veteran of two Middle East deployments, basically a traitor of the country that I love and that I’m willing to lay my life down for,” Gabbard told Rogan. “And to get away with it without any evidence or basis whatsoever.”
When Rogan asked how Clinton was able to make her accusation without any evidence to support it, Gabbard blamed “power of the Clinton machine” and “the power of the political establishment” for allowing Clinton’s accusation to go unchecked.
Gabbard is currently polling at below 2% of the national Democratic primary vote, according to RealClearPolitics. The congresswoman raised considerable controversy by meeting with Syrian dictator Bashar Assad in 2017.