Congressman Publicly Says He Would Call Female Colleagues “Eye Candy” If It Weren’t Sexist

U.S. Representative Mark Walker, of North Carolina, made a sexist comment today when speaking about the Republican Study Committee’s legislative priorities. I don’t know how he’s going to argue that, when he specifically explained that it would be sexist to say the very thing that he did indeed say, publicly, into a microphone, in front of his colleagues, but he’s sure going to try.

Walker was all riled up talking about how House-passed legislation keeps dying on Mitch McConnel’s desk in the Senate, which is especially true today, with the failure of the latest attempt to replace the Affordable Care Act with a terrible bill that no one wants. Seriously, less than half of Republicans in a CBS poll said they support the bill, making it even more ridiculous when Walker claims that the party knows what the American people want.

It’s more absurd still when he says that “this is not the unified Republican government” the “American people” wanted. I mean, that’s true, but only because the majority of the American people didn’t want any unified Republican government. We all know Donald Trump lost the popular vote, because he can’t let it go just as much as the rest of us, and Republicans got fewer votes, nationwide, for the Senate in 2016, despite occupying significantly more of the seats that were up for grabs (24 out of 34, before the election). Those votes mattered, too, losing Republicans two Senate seats that are probably the only reason bad legislation has been defeated by razor-thin margins, so we’re certainly getting what we voted for on that front.

But the absurdity of those remarks doesn’t hold a candle to what he said about the women of the RSC. Prompted only by the fact that he, himself, mentioned the “men and women of the RSC,” and reminded himself that women do, in fact, exist in government, he launched into “if it wasn’t sexist,” which may be the only preemptive defense flimsier than “I’m not racist, but …” Then, he said that he would call them “the RSC eye candy, but we’ll leave that out of the record.” You know, he would say it. If it weren’t sexist. But it is sexist, by his own admission, so he won’t. See how Not Sexist he can be? Someone get this man a cookie for the strides he’s making for women.

Predictably, as the Hill reports, he’s already walked it back, saying, “During a press event today, I made a flippant remark meant to be light hearted but fell short. I’m proud of the women who serve in our RSC leadership,” but it’s probably going to be (understandably) difficult for the women who work with him to forget how he thinks of them. The facial expression of the woman directly to his left says it all, as his comments go from recognition to objectification within seconds:

I would say Rep. Walker seems like a sexist jerk, but that would be mean, so I won’t.

(via The Hill, featured image: Shutterstock)

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