In a particularly outlandish speech from the House floor on Thursday morning, House Intelligence Committee ranking member Devin Nunes (R-CA), who has a well-documented vendetta against the media, accused Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) of being a cult leader.
He also called Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee and members of the media Schiff’s loyal “cult followers,” while arguing that the House Intelligence Committee is just a guise for an “impeachment committee.”
“Every one of their actions, from the staff they hire to the Trump conspiracy theories they investigate, their willful neglect of our basic oversight duties that this has been their plan from day one,” he said, making the remarks ahead of the House’s vote to formalize the impeachment process.
“What we’re seeing among Democrats on the Intelligence Committee down in the SCIF (Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility) right now is like a cult,” he continued. “These are a group of people loyally following their leader as he bounces from one outlandish conspiracy theory to another. And the media are the cult followers, permanently stationed outside the committee spaces, pretending to take everything seriously because they too support the goal of removing the President from office.”
NUNES: "What we're seeing among Democrats on the Intelligence Committee down in the SCIF right now is like a cult. These are a group of people loyally following their leader as he bounces from one outlandish conspiracy theory to another. And the media are the cult followers." pic.twitter.com/Y2roq9qKPN
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 31, 2019
The remarks were so outrageous, it moved Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA) to speak out against the cult comparison, a remarkable gesture given Speier’s documented hesitancy to speak about her history. While working as a staffer for Rep. Leo Ryan (D-CA), she accompanied the congressman on a fact-finding mission to the Jim Jones Peoples Temple cult in Guyana. Ryan was assassinated and Speier was shot five times during the infamous Jonestown Massacre that left more than 900 people dead in an act of mass murder-suicide.
Devin Nunes calling the Intelligence Committee’s fact-finding mission a cult is dispicable. I know about cults. Cults are led by maniacal narcissists who expect complete adoration and relinquishment of independent thought. I suggest Mr. Nunes look elsewhere.
— Jackie Speier (@RepSpeier) October 31, 2019
