Sen. Eric Schmitt completely lost his cool when repeatedly asked whether he agreed with Trump’s pardon of former Honduran president—and convicted drug smuggler—Juan Orlando Hernández.
The GOP senator whined about his treatment on This Week Sunday as George Stephanopoulos grilled him about the pardon.
“With your previous guest you had zero pushback because he’s giving the Democrat talking points like you spew every week, which is probably why your ratings are so bad,” the senator said.
The insult was one of many Schmitt lobbed at the ABC host as he grew increasingly agitated, all while sidestepping questions about how Trump’s anti-cartel stance squared with the pardon.
Asked the first time about his thoughts on the pardon, Schmitt said he wasn’t familiar with it.
“I’m not familiar with facts and circumstances, but I think what’s telling here is to try to imply that President Trump is somehow soft on drug smuggling is just ridiculous,” he raged. “It’s totally ridiculous.”
The senator then gave a meandering speech about how Trump had “provided border security like we’ve never seen before,” and skewered any notion that his actions in the Caribbean Sea could be illegal.
Schiff celebrated the killing of narco-terrorists “who are poisoning 100,000 Americans every year”—while ignoring the fact that Hernández also trafficked drugs into the U.S.—and blamed any criticism on Democrats being anti-Pete Hesgeth.
Calling the secretary of defense a “realist,” Schiff argued: “The Democrats are just upset about that and they try to create some controversy each and every week and it goes nowhere.”
Stephanopoulos seemed unmoved by the long monologue, and brought the argument back to Trump’s pardon.
“What do you mean you’re not familiar with the facts and circumstances of the pardon? It’s been reported all across the country,” he said.
The news anchor pushed: “The former president of Honduras was convicted of bringing in 400 tons of cocaine into the United States, also guns and other materials. It’s been front page news across the country. Aren’t you curious about that?”
Schmitt dodged the question again, complaining that Stephanopoulos had been nicer to the previous guest, Democrat Adam Smith.
“Well, I’m curious about your pushback on that particular point,” he said, lashing out at the ABC show’s ratings.
Schmitt protested: “To make the point, what I’m saying is you’re trying to divert here the attention from what the American people actually support.”
Ignoring the personal barb, Stephanopolous opted for third time lucky, and yet again asked: “Do you support the pardon of the convicted drug smuggler or not?”
The Missouri senator deployed evasive tactics once more. “George, like I said, what we’re talking about here are the narco terrorists poisoning Americans,” he said.
“This attempt to try to focus on a pardon is classic because you’ve lost the debate now on the narco terrorist question.”
Schmitt’s fiery words toward Stephanopoulos come after Trump publicly targeted the anchor for cutting an interview with Vice President JD Vance short.
Trump soon renamed the host ‘George Sloppodopoulos,’ and later complained to an ABC reporter at a conference: “After what you did with Stephanopoulos to the Vice President of the United States, I don’t take questions from ABC fake News.”
The feud between the two dates back to Trump’s defamation lawsuit against Stephanopoulos and ABC News, after the anchor said during an interview with Rep. Nancy Mace last year that Trump had “been found liable for rape.”
In reality, a jury found Trump liable for sexual abuse and defamation against writer E. Jean Carroll—not rape—though the presiding judge later clarified that Carroll did not “fail to prove” rape. ABC ultimately settled the lawsuit for $15 million.
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