Shocker!… Saddam Paid For Sleazy Antiwar Dems to Travel to Iraq

Puppets for the Saddam regime…

U.S. Congressmen David E. Bonior (D-Mi) (L) and Jim McDermott (D-Wa) join Salem al-Kubaisi (C), head of the Arab and Foreign Relations Committee, in attending the Iraqi parliament in Baghdad, September 30, 2002. Three U.S. Congressmen, on a humanitarian fact-finding mission in Iraq, visited the southern port city of Basra on Sunday to check the living conditions and health of civilians after more than a decade of U.N. sanctions. (REUTERS/Faleh Kheiber)

The party of sedition and sleaze continues to impress…
Three antiwar Democrats traveled to Iraq during the runup of the war in Iraq all paid for by the Saddam Hussein regime.
The antiwar Democrats insist that they had no idea Saddam was paying for their trip.
The AP reported:

Saddam Hussein’s intelligence agency secretly financed a trip to Iraq for three U.S. lawmakers during the run-up to the U.S.-led invasion, federal prosecutors said Wednesday.

An indictment unsealed in Detroit accuses Muthanna Al-Hanooti, a member of a Michigan nonprofit group, of arranging for three members of Congress to travel to Iraq in October 2002 at the behest of Saddam’s regime. Prosecutors say Iraqi intelligence officials paid for the trip through an intermediary.

At the time, the Bush administration was trying to persuade Congress to authorize military action against Iraq.

The lawmakers are not named in the indictment but the dates correspond to a trip by Democratic Reps. Jim McDermott of Washington, David Bonior of Michigan and Mike Thompson of California. None was charged and Justice Department spokesman Dean Boyd said investigators “have no information whatsoever” any of them knew the trip was underwritten by Saddam.

Both McDermott and Thompson are popular among liberal voters in their reliably Democratic districts for their anti-war views. Bonior is no longer in Congress.

Thompson released a statement Wednesday saying the trip was approved by the State Department.

“Obviously, had there been any question at all regarding the sponsor of the trip or the funding, I would not have participated,” he said.

During the trip, the lawmakers expressed skepticism about the Bush administration’s claims that Saddam was stockpiling weapons of mass destruction. Though such weapons ultimately were never found, the lawmakers drew criticism for their trip at the time.

Oklahoma Sen. Don Nickles, the second-ranking Senate Republican at the time, said the Democrats “sound somewhat like spokespersons for the Iraqi government.” Seattle-are conservatives dubbed McDermott “Baghdad Jim” for the Iraq trip.

Debbie Schlussel reported that Saddam spy Muthanna Al-Hanooti who was indicted today was a former chief of CAIR-Michigan.


Reps. Jim McDermott, D-Wash., center, and David Bonior, D-Mich., second from right, listen to a plant manager at the water-treatment project in Rastama, Baghdad. Many treatment plants have not been repaired. (October 01, 2002- Seattle PI)

NewsBusters reported that George Stephanopoulos at the time lashed out at Republicans for attacking the good antiwar democrats.

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Jim Hoft is the founder and editor of The Gateway Pundit, one of the top conservative news outlets in America. Jim was awarded the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award in 2013 and is the proud recipient of the Breitbart Award for Excellence in Online Journalism from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in May 2016. In 2023, The Gateway Pundit received the Most Trusted Print Media Award at the American Liberty Awards.

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