Connect with us

‘You’re Fundamentally Wrong On Civics’: Rachel Maddow Explains The Constitution To Rick Santorum

Published

on

One of the greatest match-ups in the world of modern politics has to be top liberal journalist Rachel Maddow interviewing one of the most right-wing anti-gay political crusaders, Rick Santorum. And it was. Watch.

Rick Santorum knows people who used to be gay but no longer are, regrets his infamous statement comparing same-sex marriage with “man-on-dog” marriage – though stands by his beliefs surrounding it – and doesn’t “spend a whole lot of time thinking about” issues like same-sex marriage or if people choose to be gay.

So he said Wednesday night when he sat down with MSNBC anchor Rachel Maddow for a heated and powerful interview that ended up revealing far more than the Republican former U.S. Senator who is again running for president bargained for – including getting a lesson on how the Constitution actually works.

“Can I ask you if you believe people choose to be gay?,” Maddow gently inquired.

“You know, I’ve never answered that question because I don’t really know the answer to that question,” Santorum, guardedly responded. Which is a bit stunning since he has worked closely with people who are gay, and has claimed to have good friends who are gay. 

“I suspect that there’s all sorts of reasons that people end up the way they are. And I’ll sort of leave it at that,” Santorum said, trying to wiggle out of a politically dangerous answer. “There are people who are alive today who identified themselves as gay and lesbian and who no longer are. That’s true. I do know — I’ve met people in that case,” he offered, after Maddow pushed for a better answer. 

“So, I guess maybe in that case, may be they did” choose to not be gay, Santorum concluded.

Not satisfied, Maddow continued.

“Do you think people choose to – people can choose to be heterosexual?”

“All I’m saying,” Santorum insisted, “I do know people who have lived a gay lifestyle and no longer live it.”

“Again, I don’t spend a whole lot of time thinking about these things to be very honest,” he added.

Maddow reminded him that he talks about gay issues and LGBT rights “all the time.” She brought up his 2003 interview when he told a reporter that since the Supreme court had just struck down the ban on sodomy, he said it was a slippery slope to legalizing “man on child, man on dog, whatever the case may be.”

Santorum told Maddow he regretted that remark.

“It was a flippant comment that should have come out of my mouth. But the substance of what I said, which is what I’ve referred to, I stand by that. I wish I had not said it in a flippant term that I did, and I know people were offended by it, and I wish I hadn’t said it.”

But he couldn’t bring himself to apologize for it.

The two began the interview with a debate over the Constitution. 

Santorum offered his view, which is that Congress and the President have as much right to say a law is unconstitutional as does the Supreme court, and he strongly suggested that the opinions of the legislative and executive branches of government are equal to that of the supreme Court on constitutional law.

The Supreme Court is “not a superior branch of government. I mean, if the Congress comes back and says, you know, we disagree with you and were able to pass a law and get it signed by the president and say, courts, you’re wrong, I mean,” Santorum argued, forcing Maddow to interject.

Here’s the exchange, via Real Clear Politics:

SANTORUM: Why not? Why? 

MADDOW: You can amend the Constitution. 

SANTORUM: Why?

MADDOW: They’re ruling on the constitutionality of that law. 

SANTORUM: What if they’re doing it with an — from an unconstitutional basis? I mean —

MADDOW: They decide what’s constitutional. That’s how our government works.

SANTORUM: No, no, that’s not necessarily true. The Congress has the right. 

When I took my oath of office as a United States senator, what did I say? I would uphold the Constitution. 

And my feeling is, and I think it’s clearly from our founding documents, that the Congress has a right to say what’s constitutional. The president has a right to say what’s constitutional. And that’s part of the dynamic called checks and balances. 

MADDOW: Yes. But — I mean, you’re fundamentally wrong on civics, right? If there is, if there is a question as to the constitutionality of a law, it gets adjudicated. 

SANTORUM: Right.

MADDOW: And the second syllable of that word means it get decided in the judiciary, the Supreme Court decides whether or not a law is constitutional. So, you could not now pass a law – 

SANTORUM: But if they have —

MADDOW: — that said we’re banning same sex marriage.

The debate went back and forth, with Santorum at one point explaining his view of how the Supreme court decided that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry.

“I think what was going on with this court is what Justice Kennedy was saying. You know, we sort of see this definition of liberty is whatever we want it to be. And this is sort of where the culture is going right now and so this is what we’re going to do,” Santorum insisted, wholly ignoring the 14th Amendment on which the Court based its opinion.

“He didn’t tie to it any constitutional basis,” Santorum insisted, wrongly. “There’s no precedent that set — that gives him the ability to create this new right in the Constitution,” he decried, again ignoring that the Supreme Court has many times stated marriage is a fundamental right.

“And so, if it’s created on a whole cloth, it can be re-created in a different way out of whole cloth. And I think that’s the role of the Congress is to pressure the court to get it right.”

UPDATE –
The video at the top is what MSNBC provided, it is not the complete interview. For real political junkies, here’s the complete interview, which includes the beginning portion that MSNBC cut:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4g2FKzhB9Os 

 

Image: Screenshot via MSNBC
Transcript via Real Clear Politics

Related Topics:
Continue Reading
Click to comment
 
 

Enjoy this piece?

… then let us make a small request. The New Civil Rights Movement depends on readers like you to meet our ongoing expenses and continue producing quality progressive journalism. Three Silicon Valley giants consume 70 percent of all online advertising dollars, so we need your help to continue doing what we do.

NCRM is independent. You won’t find mainstream media bias here. From unflinching coverage of religious extremism, to spotlighting efforts to roll back our rights, NCRM continues to speak truth to power. America needs independent voices like NCRM to be sure no one is forgotten.

Every reader contribution, whatever the amount, makes a tremendous difference. Help ensure NCRM remains independent long into the future. Support progressive journalism with a one-time contribution to NCRM, or click here to become a subscriber. Thank you. Click here to donate by check.

News

Just 100 Days in and Trump White House Is Already Prepping for Impeachment: Report

Published

1 hour ago

on

April 29, 2025

By

President Donald Trump has reached the 100-day mark of his second term, and already administration officials are preparing for an impeachment defense—despite the fact that the House and the Senate are under Republican control, and the midterm elections are more than 18 months away.

Trump’s advisors “are seriously considering the likelihood that he would be impeached again if Democrats take the House next year,” Axios reports.

“I’m certain,” Trump’s longtime pollster, John McLaughlin, told Axios—an opinion reportedly shared by others in Trump’s “orbit.”

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt blasted U.S. Rep. Shri Thanedar (D-MI), who filed seven articles of impeachment against President Trump on Monday.

READ MORE: ‘Rank Incompetence’: Trump Says Hegseth Is ‘Safe’ Just Before Navy ‘Loses’ $60 Million Jet

“Who the hell is this lunatic?” the Press Secretary asked, according to Axios.

U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff (D-GA) on Friday signaled support for a Trump impeachment, becoming the first swing state Senator to do so.

“The threat of impeachment has added urgency to the Trump administration’s push to get as much of his agenda through Congress as possible before the 2026 midterms — especially his plan to extend his 2017 tax cuts,” Axios noted.

“We need to pass the tax cuts and avoid a recession,” McLaughlin said. “That’s the high stakes here. We cannot lose the midterms.”

Some economic experts say a recession may now be the best possible outcome, not just in the U.S., but globally, driven by President Trump’s tariff and trade wars. Others are raising alarms about the risk of “stagflation.”

READ MORE: ‘Heads on Pikes’: Trump White House Accused of ‘Vaguely Fascist’ Display

Trump insiders reportedly also feel an impeachment threat could help solidify the MAGA base, and be a fundraising boon.

“Trump’s attacks on due process, birthright citizenship, humanitarian aid, and the courts are not ‘politics,'” Congressman Thanedar wrote on Monday. “They are a direct attack on our democracy. Enough is enough.”

Meanwhile, at The Bulwark, Jill Lawrence writes that she took a “look at all the impeachment articles against presidents and figure[d] out how many Trump has already matched or surpassed.”

“Spoiler: It has not been fun. And the answer is pretty much all of them—from Andrew Johnson in 1868 to the charges in Trump’s own pair of impeachments a few short years ago. How do we know? Because it’s all unfolding publicly and blatantly in real time.”

RELATED: ‘Authoritarian Takeover’: Legal Scholars Warn of Trump’s ‘100 Days of Lawlessness’

 

Image via Reuters

Continue Reading

News

‘Rank Incompetence’: Trump Says Hegseth Is ‘Safe’ Just Before Navy ‘Loses’ $60 Million Jet

Published

17 hours ago

on

April 28, 2025

By

Editor’s note: A typo in the headline has been corrected.

Just hours after President Donald Trump declared in a newly published interview that he believes Pete Hegseth is “gonna get it together” and described his embattled Defense Secretary’s job as “safe,” the U.S. Navy accidentally lost a $60 million fighter jet when it fell into the Red Sea.

“A US Navy F/A-18 Super Hornet fighter jet has been ‘lost’ at sea after it fell overboard from the USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier while it was being towed on board, the Navy said in a statement on Monday,” according to CNN. Reports also indicate that “the Truman made a hard turn to evade Houthi fire, which contributed to the fighter jet falling overboard.”

The jet is said to have sunk.

In their interview, The Atlantic’s Ashley Parker told Trump, “You’re a big supporter of Pete Hegseth’s, but he’s fired three top advisers in recent weeks, he rotated out his chief of staff, he installed a makeup studio at the Pentagon, he put attack plans in two different Signal chats, including one with his wife and personal attorney. Have you had a talk with him about getting things together?”

READ MORE: ‘Heads on Pikes’: Trump White House Accused of ‘Vaguely Fascist’ Display

“Yeah, I have,” the Commander-in-Chief replied.

Asked, “What did you say?” Trump replied: “Pete’s gone through a hard time. I think he’s gonna get it together. I think he’s a smart guy. He is a talented guy. He’s got a lot of energy. He’s been beat up by this, very much so. But I had a talk with him, a positive talk, but I had a talk with him.”

And when asked if, “for now, you think Hegseth stays?” Trump replied: “Yeah, he’s safe.”

Critics were quick to weigh in.

“This is why I said @petehegseth’s rank incompetence needs closer scrutiny here,” wrote national security and civil liberties journalist Marcy Wheeler. “He keeps claiming his half-a—- campaign against the Houthis is having success. But s— like this keeps happening, planes dropping off aircraft carriers.”

“These are the sailors Whiskey Pete put at risk with his reckless treatment of classified information,” Wheeler added.

“Another win for this super competent national security team,” mocked U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT). “I thought our strikes in Yemen were ‘restoring deterrence’.”

READ MORE: ‘Authoritarian Takeover’: Legal Scholars Warn of Trump’s ‘100 Days of Lawlessness’

Democratic political strategist Chris D. Jackson adds, “This is what happens when Trump and Pete Hegseth treated military leadership like a frat house. Unqualified leadership has real-world consequences.”

Barbara Starr, the former CNN national security reporter for more than two decades, strongly suggested there is more here than may appear.

“IMPORTANT: IF [the] Truman had to make a sudden hard turn to avoid enemy fire this is extremely significant. The goal for US troops is to always bring down the enemy as far away as possible NOT close in. And this potentially suggests further improvements in Houthi guidance and targeting. Def more to learn here.”

“Moreover,” Starr continued, “and equally important why does the military press statement not disclose this possibility?”

HuffPost’s White House correspondent S.V. Dáte commented, “Back when the Navy was woke I don’t recall them dropping an F-18 overboard.”

READ MORE: Trump Calls to ‘Immediately’ Eject ‘Disruptors’ as GOP Congressman Faces Boos, Backlash

 

Image via Reuters

Continue Reading

News

‘Heads on Pikes’: Trump White House Accused of ‘Vaguely Fascist’ Display

Published

19 hours ago

on

April 28, 2025

By

The Trump White House is under fire after Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt posted a video showing lawn signs lining the White House driveway, bearing the photos of allegedly undocumented immigrants, the charges against them, and the word “ARRESTED” in bold, capital letters.

The posters do not indicate the immigrants were convicted, only arrested, for various major crimes.

ABC News described them as “100 posters of alleged criminal migrants.” Axios, which first reported on the posters, called it “a provocative, sure-to-be-controversial move.”

“This morning,” the White House said in a statement, “images of the worst of the worst criminal illegal immigrants arrested since President Donald J. Trump took office were placed on the lawn of the White House for the world to see — highlighting the Trump Administration’s unprecedented effort to secure our homeland and send these vicious criminals back where they belong.”

READ MORE: ‘Authoritarian Takeover’: Legal Scholars Warn of Trump’s ‘100 Days of Lawlessness’

Leavitt posted the video gleefully declaring, “Good Morning from The White House!”

Critics blasted her and the administration.

“These are fake charges with out due process you are lying karoline! 99% of immigrants are law abiding, loving, family oriented members of society! Stop spreading hate!” wrote actor and activist John Leguizamo.

Immigration attorney Allen Orr, Jr. added, “Arrests are not convictions. In addition, how much does this cost, and for what purpose does it serve?”

Alexander Aviña, an associate professor of Latin American history at Arizona State University commented, “historically not a good sign when governments start doing this.”

Former U.S. Ambassador Luis Moreno observed, “The Romans, and others throughout history, used to mount their enemies heads on pikes. This is the 2025 version.”

READ MORE: Trump Calls to ‘Immediately’ Eject ‘Disruptors’ as GOP Congressman Faces Boos, Backlash

“The Trump Administration’s response to deporting a 4 year old American with cancer? Put up yard signs!” commented Fox News co-host Jessica Tarlov.

“Well this is vaguely fascist,” remarked MSNBC columnist Michael A. Cohen.

“And here comes the 100 lawsuits based on the liberty clause. This is disgusting behavior by our chief executive,” wrote Washburn University School of Law Professor Joseph Mastrosimone.

“Reminder that 90% of those supposed criminal deportees to El Salvador had no criminal record at all and the rest were mostly for immigration violations,” noted Virginia Commonwealth University Associate Professor of Political Science Michael Paarlberg.

Legal reporter Amy Miller wrote, “fear mongering works, and they know it.”

Watch the video below or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘What Fascism Looks Like’: Bondi’s War on Judiciary Is ‘Red Line’ for Democrats

 

Image via Reuters

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2020 AlterNet Media.