By Meryl Kornfield
Reporter
The Washington Post
For the second time this week, Republican senators grilled President Biden’s pick to head the White House budget office over her history of controversial tweets — infuriating critics of the GOP who said the lawmakers were hypocritical for chastising nominee Neera Tanden while failing to speak up about former president Donald Trump’s incendiary tweetstorms now at the center of an impeachment inquiry.
During a heated back-and-forth, Sen. John Neely Kennedy (R-La.), known for his colorful expressions, accused Tanden of attacking lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, including Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).
“You called Senator Sanders everything but an ignorant slut,” he said, evoking the sexist term famously satirized on “Saturday Night Live.”
He asked Tanden nine times in a row whether she meant her tweets when she sent them. Tanden, president of the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank, didn’t immediately answer the question but then said, “I must have meant them, but I really regret them.”
Kennedy’s line of questioning during the Senate Budget Committee hearing came a day after other Republican lawmakers called Tanden’s past online remarks “combative” and said they clashed with Biden’s promise of unity.