Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN) told CNN’s Jim Sciutto on Monday that he saw newly-elected QAnon-sympathizing Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) giving a tour of the U.S. Capitol to a large group of people before the Trump insurrection.
Said Cohen: “We saw Congressman Boebert taking a group of people for a tour sometime after the 3rd and before the 6th. I don’t remember the date. We were walking in a tunnel and we saw her … and she had a large group with her. Now whether those people were people who were involved in the insurrection or not, I do not know. She was a freshman. She might have had a large number of people coming in to be with her on this historic occasion and just wanted to give them a tour. Bit it was pretty clear that her team, is the team … she’s not on the home team. She was with the visitors.”
Asked if he knew that anybody in Boebert’s tour was involved in the riot, Cohen replied, ‘No.'”
Last week we reported that Rep. Mikie Sherill (D-NJ) said she saw Republican members of Congress leading groups of people on what she called “reconnaissance tours” of the U.S. Capitol one day before the January 6 insurrection by mobs of pro-Trump domestic terrorists. She did not name those members.
Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney gave an interview to MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace saying that he didn’t have firsthand knowledge about the incident but had spoken to a Member who had seen it personally and then he made some remarks about “new colleagues” who “believe in conspiracy theories and want to carry guns into the House Chamber.”
Boebert (R-CO), a QAnon sympathizer who owns a gun themed restaurant called “Shooters” and has said she would carry a gun to Congress, saw herself in those remarks and sent off a fiery letter accusing Maloney of making “false and baseless” claims about her that have led to death threats.
“Rep. Sean Maloney made false and baseless conspiracy claims about me that led to death threats and hundreds of vile phone calls and emails. His comments were extremely offensive, shameful and dangerous,” wrote Boebert in a tweet.
Problem is, Maloney never mentioned her by name, but he did deliver this eviscerating response to her tweet: “Um, I’ve never said your name in public, @RepBoebert. Never. Not once. (If you’re going to be a gun nut, you probably shouldn’t go off half cocked.) I’ll tweet the transcript so you can see…but that might be like ‘a fact’, so might not help you.”
