If it weren’t for hypocrites, politics would be a pretty lonely business.
And in this midterm election cycle, the left is showcasing a bumper crop of hypocrites.
Mama’s boy James Talarico immediately comes to mind. The left’s great white hope to win back a Texas Senate seat after 30-plus years in the political wilderness wagged his finger at his Republican opponent, accusing state Attorney General Ken Paxton of voter fraud from the “wrong address” only to get caught up in his own allegation.
As The Federalist first reported, the Christianity-hating Christian appears to have used his mother’s Austin address to register to vote in order to launch a previous Texas House campaign. Redistricting in 2022 forced the finger-wagger out of his district to for a more Democrat-friendly House seat.
Texas voting records more than suggest that Talarico used the address to vote in five elections, an apparent violation of Texas election law.
Fractured Facts
And then there’s Sarah Trone Garriott, another leftist identifying as a “moderate” running for Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District. The pinkish district includes the Hawkeye State’s capital city. It’s a must-have and one Democrats believe they can pluck in their quest to take back the House this midterm.
As the Cedar Rapids Gazette’s Althea Cole recently wrote in a piece headlined “Democrats change course on gender identity,” Trone Garriott brought the race maybe “the most egregious example of saying one thing and voting another.” She state senator “actually spent money” on a TV spot telling voters she opposes “letting men in women’s locker rooms.”
“I don’t know how she could say that with a straight face,” Cole wrote. “When the bill to prohibit that very thing came to the floor of the Iowa Senate in 2023, Trone Garriott voted ‘NO’ without hesitation. Her supposed change of heart is either quite the about-face or bold-faced lie.”
Last week, Trone Garriott’s campaign rolled out another ad accusing two-term incumbent Zach Nunn of failing to hold China “accountable” while his campaign and leadership PAC pocketed contributions from China-based agribusiness giants. The ad blasts the Des Moines metro Republican for missing hearings this session of the House committee charged with accessing threats posed by the Chinese Communist Party.
“There’s one committee in Congress with the sole purpose of holding China accountable, and for nearly half the hearings, Zach Nunn didn’t even bother to show up,” the ad’s ominous-sounding narrator asserts. “But Nunn did show up to vote to allow Chinese companies to buy American farmland. After he took thousands from those same companies.”
Like so many attack ads, this one is a stretch.
Nunn has been an ardent opponent of policies allowing foreign adversaries — China at the top of the list — to purchase American farmland. That includes the Republican’s support of the Protecting American Agriculture from Foreign Adversaries Act and the Protecting U.S. Farmland and Sensitive Sites From Foreign Adversaries Act. In fact, Nunn led passage of the latter bill, aimed at strengthening national security review of purchases of agricultural land near sensitive military sites by China state-owned companies.
But facts, and definitely context, have long been lacking in political campaign ads. And this one doubled down on truth-twisting.
“After he took thousands from those same companies. Nunn even sponsored a bill helping China sell more pork, directly hurting Iowa farmers,” Trone Garriott’s attack ad claims.
The bill aims to stop states like California from imposing their distaste for pigs raised in confinement centers on pork producers and the market, prohibitions that have indeed hurt Iowa farmers — and consumers.
Ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to the White House on Thursday, Nunn fired out a press release urging Trump to “hold Beijing accountable to its commitments to Iowa farmers and American workers.”
“Beijing has a long record of making promises and failing to deliver on them,” he said. “I pushed the Administration to secure China’s commitment to reopen its market to American soybeans earlier this year, and that was an important win for Iowa farmers. But it’s clear we can’t take Beijing at its word. Any new trade agreement must be enforceable and open markets for American products without giving China more leverage over our farmers, manufacturers, or national security.”
The Architect
Nunn’s campaign and political alley Call to Serve PAC did take thousands of dollars from the Syngenta Corporation Employee Political Action Committee. A combined $17,500 between 2022 and May of this year, according to Federal campaign finance filings. Smithfield Foods reportedly chipped in more than $1,000. Syngenta Group, headquartered in Switzerland, is held by China National Chemical Corp, a Chinese state-owned conglomerate. China’s WH Group has owned Smithfield since 2013.
Trone Garriott’s ad leaves out a few important details. A sin of omission, if you will, for the Lutheran pastor. Turns out Trone Garriott has her own China connections.
Her campaign is bankrolled by the architect of the deal that sold out Syngenta to ChemChina, corporate merger and acquisition lawyer and corporate partner at M&A behemoth Simpson Thatcher & Bartlett, Alan Klein. According to his bio, Klein represented “ChemChina in its $43 billion acquisition of Syngenta” in 2017, a deal that outmaneuvered prospective American buyers.
Klein shepherded “the largest outbound Chinese acquisition ever,” at $43 billion, according to The Street.
“ChemChina came in as a white knight as the Basel, Switzerland-based agribusiness giant was fending off an unwanted approach from St. Louis-based rival Monsanto,” the publication reported.
In February, Klein cut the Trone Garriott campaign two checks totaling $3,000.
Big China makes another appearance on Trone Garriott’s campaign finance files. Jonathan and Jennifer Soros (yes, of that famous leftist family) have donated a total of $14,000 to the Democrat. In 2005, the Soros fund, invested $25 million in a China’s fourth-largest carrier, Hainan Airlines.
‘CCP-Linked Campaign Checks’
Nunn in many ways is a tough target to attack on China. The Air Force combat veteran served as an airborne intelligence officer, flying reconnaissance missions off the coasts of China and Russia. He has logged more than 700 combat hours, and now serves as a colonel in the Air Force reserve.
A spokesman for the congressman pointed to Trone Garriott’s hypocrisy on the subject.
“Zach Nunn spent 20 years in the Air Force standing up to America’s adversaries and has gotten legislation to counter the Chinese Communist Party signed into law,” the spokesman told The Federalist in a statement. “Iowans don’t have to guess where he stands. The same can’t be said about Sarah Trone Garriott, whose only record on China is cashing CCP-linked campaign checks.”
