CodePink activists get booted from hearing trashing CodePink

BS BULLETIN:

CodePink co-founder Medea Benjamin and two fellow activists were removed from a House hearing Tuesday examining alleged foreign influence operations inside the United States.
The irony was difficult to miss: CodePink itself was repeatedly singled out during the hearing as an alleged “Trojan horse” for foreign interests.
Benjamin denies taking direction from China or any other foreign government, and CodePink disputes allegations that its activism is controlled by Beijing.

If you’re going to attend a congressional hearing investigating alleged foreign “Trojan horses,” getting yourself thrown out while your own organization is being discussed probably isn’t the quiet approach.

CodePink co-founder Medea Benjamin and two other activists were escorted from Tuesday’s House Foreign Affairs subcommittee hearing examining covert foreign influence operations in the United States.

The hearing had an appropriately subtle title:

“Trojan Horses: Covert Foreign Malign Influence Operations in America.”

Benjamin wore a pink “NO WAR IN IRAN” CodePink shirt. Other activists displayed messages including “SANCTIONS KILL,” placing the slogans directly behind witnesses and in view of the hearing cameras.

About 30 minutes into the proceedings, Subcommittee Chairman Bill Huizenga, R-Mich., suspended the hearing while U.S. Capitol Police approached the activists.

They hadn’t actually interrupted anybody.

“We do have some folks who have not verbally disrupted the committee as of yet,” Huizenga said.

He said the clerk had determined that the shirts and activists’ conduct constituted a protest.

Benjamin complied when police asked her to leave but protested the decision as she was escorted out.

Ranking Democrat Sydney Kamlager-Dove objected, arguing that the activists were exercising free-speech rights and “certainly were not being disruptive.”

But what made the scene especially notable was the subject being discussed inside the room.

Huizenga had opened the hearing by accusing China, Cuba, Iran and Russia of attempting to manipulate American public opinion through covert influence campaigns.

And he specifically named CodePink.

Huizenga accused Shanghai-based American businessman Neville Roy Singham of using his wealth and relationships in China to provide millions of dollars to organizations including CodePink, the People’s Forum and the Party for Socialism and Liberation.

“People like Singham and groups like CODEPINK and the growing communist propaganda in our country have become our adversaries’ Trojan horses to sow division from within,” Huizenga said.

Fox News reported that its investigation traced $1.33 million in Singham-linked funding to CodePink.

Benjamin isn’t hiding from the accusation.

Before the hearing, Heritage Foundation senior fellow Mike Gonzalez confronted her and told her to “stop shilling for a communist tyranny.”

Benjamin pushed back.

“I’ve been an anti-war activist from the days of Vietnam. I never had a foreign government tell me what to do.”

She described war as an “abomination” and said her activism comes from that conviction.

CodePink and other organizations associated with the Singham-funded network have denied that their activities are directed by the Chinese government.

Singham has not been criminally charged in connection with the allegations.

Benjamin is separately facing federal scrutiny over CodePink’s March trip to Cuba.

The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control has requested information concerning the trip, its participants and approximately $600,000 in aid CodePink says the delegation brought to Cuba. An administrative inquiry is not itself a finding that Benjamin or CodePink violated sanctions law.

So Washington managed to produce quite a scene:

A hearing about organizations allegedly being used to influence American political debate featured one of the organizations accused of doing exactly that sitting directly behind the witnesses — until Capitol Police showed them the door.