In my decades of covering congressional hearings, I have never seen a witness try to end their own hearing because they didn’t want to answer a question.
That is what Kash Patel did at a Senate FBI oversight hearing on Tuesday.
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Sen. Schiff tried to get an answer out of Patel on a question that Sen. Cory Booker asked earlier.
Schiff asked, “ Mr. Booker tried to get an answer from you, a very simple answer, about the reporter who wrote an article about potential misuse of an FBI SWAT team by yourself.”
Patel interrupted, “Didn't happen. Total lie.”
Schiff continued, “And what he asked you, so let me repeat it, because you didn't answer his question.”
Patel interrupted again, “You're gonna repeat a lie… so I'm not gonna answer it.”
Schiff appealed to Chairman Chuck Grassley, “Mr. Chairman, uh, we're gonna have to extend time the more he does this.”
Patel, “We don't have to extend anything.”
Schiff, “So I'm trying to ask my question, Mr. Chairman.”
After some back and forth, Patel had the nerve to ask Grassley to end the hearing while Schiff was questioning him.
The administration is so confident in its control of Congressional Republicans that it asks for hearings to be ended when it doesn’t want to answer questions.
Patel went on a whining monologue where he played the victim.
