Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-CA), during a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing, lashed out at journalist Matt Taibbi, calling him a “serial sexual harasser.”
Her remarks came before Taibbi gave his opening statement in the hearing, titled “Censorship-Industrial Complex: The Need for First Amendment Safeguards at the State Department.”
Kamlager-Dove opened by arguing that the hearing was an unnecessary waste of taxpayer dollars and intimated that the notion that the State Department is funding politically biased censorship is a conspiracy theory. Then, she took aim at Taibbi, the Republicans’ witness.
“The majority is relitigating a made-up conspiracy theory about a part of the State Department that no longer exists to distract from the dumpster fire foreign policy this administration is pursuing and elevating a serial sexual harasser as their star witness in the process,” the lawmaker said.
She requested that the committee enter two articles into the record. “The first is a Chicago reader article entitled 20 years ago in Moscow, Matt Taibi was a misogynist a-hole, and possibly worse, and a Washington Post article titled The Two Expat Bros Who Terrorized Women Correspondents in Moscow,” she noted.
Kamlager-Dove then tried to distract from the topic of the hearing, bringing up President Donald Trump’s tariffs and lashing out to Tesla owner Elon Musk.
This hearing could not be more out of touch with the concerns of everyday Americans. People's retirement savings are being decimated as Trump's arbitrary temper tariffs tank the stock market. They are staring down the barrel of cuts to their Social Security and Medicare there because the Republican majority wants to give a tax break to billionaires like Elon Musk, who have deep financial ties to our adversaries. Meanwhile, Trump is siding with Putin against our national security interests and risking the lives of American soldiers in a signal group chat.
The lawmaker went on to suggest that the Trump administration is the true threat to free speech, pointing to the detention of college students accused of supporting terrorist group Hamas.
Instead of addressing the topic at hand, Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove resurrected old, unproven sexual harassment allegations against journalist Matt Taibbi, claiming he is "a serial sexual harasser."
— Jeff Charles, The Nullifier🏴 (@jeffcharlesjr) April 1, 2025
The hearing is about government censorship. pic.twitter.com/KVLb9AOB5v
There is no evidence that Taibbi sexually harassed women. The issue stems from a book the journalist co-authored, which contained provocative content. His detractors claim this is evidence that he sexually harassed women. Taibbi has denied the allegations, and there have been no legal proceedings against him.
There is also the fact that old accusations against Taibbi have absolutely nothing to do with the purpose of the hearing: Censorship. Kamlager-Dove used a reprehensible smear tactic against Taibbi instead of trying to refute his arguments – a strategy that other Democrats on the panel employed.
In fact, her decision to bring up the allegations shows that she and her Democratic colleagues have no argument. The reality is that the State Department did fund organizations like the Global Disinformation Index, Global Engagement Center, Newsguard, and other entities that actively sought to suppress right-leaning speech on the internet. Apparently, this isn’t a problem as long as it affects their political opposition.
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