Kevin McCarthy Calls Out Madison Cawthorn Over Zelensky Comments: If Anyone’s a Thug ‘It’s Putin’
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) called Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC) “wrong” on Friday for calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky a “thug.”
“One of your colleagues, Madison Cawthorn, called Zelensky a thug. He also suggested [Ukraine] is pushing disinformation,” said CNN chief congressional correspondent Manu Raju. “Have you spoken to him and do you support his re-election?”
“Madison is wrong,” replied McCarhty. “If there’s any thug in this world, it’s Putin.”
But when asked, McCarthy added that, yes, he supports Cawthorn’s re-election.
Recently, Cawthorn was caught on video saying, “Remember that Zelensky is a thug. Remember that the Ukrainian government is incredibly corrupt and is incredibly evil and has been pushing woke ideologies.”
“Zelenskyy is a thug. Remember that the Ukrainian government is incredibly corrupt and is incredibly evil and has been pushing woke ideologies.”
h/t @WRAL pic.twitter.com/cf3sew7MOp
— The Republican Accountability Project (@AccountableGOP) March 10, 2022
His remarks have since been played on Russian state TV.
Cawthorn spokesperson Luke Ball told PEOPLE that his boss “was expressing his displeasure at how foreign leaders, including Zelensky, had recently used false propaganda to entice America into becoming involved in an overseas conflict.” Ball did not specify what that “false propaganda” was.
Watch above, via CSPAN.
