As backlash continues to come at the White House over President Donald Trump's choice to assassinate a foreign leader, his supporters in his administration and Congress scramble to create excuses and false equivalencies.
Among those congressional supporters is Arizona Republican Representative Paul Gosar.
On Monday afternoon, Gosar—a dentist who identifies himself of Dr. Paul Gosar on Twitter—posted a bit of creative artwork on Twitter. The problem was the Arizona Republican tried to pass off his manipulated photo as fact.
Gosar posted this on Twitter:
@DrPaulGosar/Twitter
The image is supposed to be a photo of former President Barack Obama and current Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.
The issues are multiple with this post.
First, President Rouhani is the current President of Iran. Either Gosar thought the person photoshopped next to Obama is deceased General Qasem Soleimani or he is unaware of who the President of Iran is.
Second is the photo manipulation itself.
The original photo was of President Obama meeting with India's former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
President Rouhani and President Obama never met.
The move by a sitting Congressman was considered disrespectful to India as well as the United States.
His choice to share the badly manipulated photo did little to help the reputation and public trust for the GOP.
Gosar accused the press of being dimwitted in response to the backlash he received for not knowing Rouhani is still President and for sharing a fake photo.
In his response he tweeted:
"1. To the dim witted reporters like @dmedin11: no one said this wasn't photoshopped. No one said the president of Iran was dead. No one said Obama met with Rouhani in person. The tweet says: 'the world is a better place without either of them in power'."
"2. The point remains to all but the dimmest: Obama coddled, appeased, nurtured and protected the worlds No. 1 sponsor of terror. The world is better without Obama as president. The world will be better off without Rouhani."
Despite his claim that his sharing a faked photo and inaccurate information was justified, the tweet was deleted. Whether Gosar, a member of his staff or Twitter deleted the faked and erroneous information is unclear.
Although the deletion may be best for Gosar.
Neither the original post or his response to the backlash went over well.
@4everNeverTrump/Twitter
This is not Gosar's first time in the spotlight.
During House hearings in June 2018, Gosar was mocked for his "I'm a dentist so I know..." speech. In 2018, his six siblings all endorsed his opponent in his reelection bid.
In January of 2019, he took flack for tweeting lies about the government shutdown.
In November, Gosar added a conspiracy theory to an unrelated Twitter thread. And just in time for the holidays, Gosar tweeted a photo celebrating violence against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Gosar is up for reelection in 2020. He faces Democratic challenger Delina DiSanto.
Gosar—who has been in office since 2011—also faces at least one GOP primary challenger, Anne Marie Ward. Both women hope to remove Dr. Gosar from his seat in Congress.
This shirt, promoting voting out people like Gosar, is available here.
@simuliu/X
@realDonaldTrump/Truth Social
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