Congresswoman LaMonica McIver (D-NJ) easily won reelection in her minority-majority district despite the fact that she has been indicted on federal charges of assaulting, resisting, impeding and interfering with federal officers at New Jersey's Delaney Hall immigration detention facility in May 2025, and faces possible trial.
But Tuesday on MS NOW's The Weeknight, she was presented as innocent, and a victim of sexism and racism by co-hosts Symone Sanders-Townsend and Luke Russert.
At first it appeared that McIver was brought on to weigh in on House Republicans electing Jim Jordan as Minority Leader hours earlier. Sanders began the segment by ripping the move, and taking a shot at Jordan, calling him, "one of Donald Trump's most vocal and loyal lackeys" who never wears a blazer (horrors!), wants to make it harder for you to vote, and will be in lockstep with the most "extreme policies" of Stephen Miller.
After introducing McIver, she tossed to Russert, who played several out-of-context clips of Jordan, and followed them with, "So there you have Jim Jordan," before handing it over to his guest, who went right to name calling.
McIVER: First of all, I'm not shocked either, just disgraceful and quite honestly, a creep when I think about representative Jim Jordan....They literally had the worst ever election season, and this is how they come back strong.... It's just awful and they haven't learned their lesson.
After another short McIver response ripping Jordan, Miller, Trump and the GOP, Sanders-Townsend turned the conversation to her reelection and went after the New York Post for how they reported on it (previously linked above), including putting the headline on screen: "Indicted NJ Dem LaMonica McIver wins reelection bid despite ongoing ICE case."
After gloating about how big McIver's win was, Sanders-Townsend declared the charges against her are not credible, despite it being obvious from video that McIver was obstructing officers from arresting Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, and pushing them away. They were role-playing #Resistance. Leftists love getting arrested as theater.
SANDERS-TOWNSEND: This framing would have you believe that-- you have done something egregious to the point that these charges against you are credible. And my personal opinion, they are not. I don't even understand, frankly, why the judge has not thrown this out....
You are facing 17 years in federal prison, a felony for, I would argue, doing your job.... But this is insane. And they are targeting you and using you as a test case, I believe.
McIver agreed, saying they are trying to criminalize congressional oversight.
McIVER: So that's why I'm being used as the playbook to see if they can get away with doing it and what it makes Stephen Miller and the entire clan of them happy to see me in jail? Absolutely. This is why they're pushing so hard....It's B.S.
And then it was Russert's turn, and he used it to take the charges against McIver to another level.
RUSSERT: I think it speaks to a larger scale issue, how much they fear the investigative role of congress. They fear members of congress doing their jobs, but also it feeds into sexism. It feeds into racism.
He then falsely claimed that McIver was pregnant during her confrontations, as if that would matter.
RUSSERT: And I think for folks who are not familiar with your case, when this happened you were pregnant. They were physically, were stopping you--
McIVER: Well not yet--
RUSSERT: Well, okay, you were on your way, okay.
Not being pregnant is not "on your way." But Russert wasn't finished with his baby obsession.
RUSSERT: Part of this is you just had a baby. Okay? If they get what they want, what they're trying to do, your baby would be an adult before you would get out of jail. All because you were trying to figure out what ICE was holding back and remind you they're more than happy to go after you. The person who shot Renee Good walks as a free man. The person who shot Alex Pretti, walks as a free man. The person who tackled senator Alex Padilla walks to a free man. It just shows you where they are.
McIver recently gave birth. Does Russert believe it gives her a pass and her charges should be dropped? Is that how our criminal justice system works?
Soon McIver picked up on Russert's racism claim.
McIVER: They saw a young black congressmember woman showing up, we know how they hate black women.... And they're going to use every inch of their power to try to punish me and try to hurt me physically, mentally, spiritually and emotionally to, you know, crave their racist desires.
This segment was a total one-sided joke, complete with name calling, and unsubstantiated claims of racism and sexism leveled against the criminal justice system, not just from the guest but from the hosts as well. MS NOW at its "best."
