Senate filibuster remains intact after Manchin, Sinema vote with Republicans
Fox News congressional correspondent Chad Pergram reports from Capitol Hill on the fallout.
U.S. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona is no stranger to taking flak from fellow Democrats for bucking the party line -- but a former high-level aide to President Barack Obama may have crossed another line.
"I think she’s a c---," Alyssa Mastromonaco told the "Pod Save America" podcast earlier this month, after Sinema refused to side with other Democrats regarding the filibuster. "That’s what I have to say."
Mastromonaco chose a fairly large platform for her profanity-laced remarks: According to Chartable, the podcast has enormous reach, and is the seventh-highest news program on Apple Podcasts.
Former Obama aide Alyssa Mastromonaco, left, and U.S. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz. (Getty Images)
The comments came in a segment on "notably bad punditry." Mastromonaco was asked to weigh in on a Washington Post article titled "How Kyrsten Sinema defended the filibuster – and bipartisanship."
WARNING: GRAPHIC LANGUAGE
Specifically, there was a quote from the piece, "Sinema also exhibited passion about something that doesn’t usually elicit such emotions in politics these days: bipartisanship and moderation."
"You guys, I have real issues with her," Mastromonaco said. "They are many-fold."
She singled out a speech Sinema gave on the Senate floor.
"She talks about the ‘disease of division,’" Mastromonaco said about the senator. "She gave the speech as Joe Biden was on [his] way up to the Hill. So anyway, it’s the s---tiest, grossest, most disrespectful thing she could’ve done. I think she’s a c---. That’s what I have to say."
The hosts, also ex-Obama staffers, laughed in response, before one asked, "Do we have to beep that?"
"No, because I’m a woman," Mastromonaco replied. "I’m a woman, OK?"
MANCHIN ACCUSES FELLOW DEMS OF TAKING ‘EASY WAY OUT' WITH FILIBUSTER NUCLEAR OPTION VOTE
Then she continued, "It was so many layers of a—holeness, like you know that she played a combative video game before she went down to the Senate floor, and was like, ‘You are a maverick. You are a maverick!’ And b----, you’re not a maverick. OK? No. You’re trash."
The conversation then moved to the late Sen. John McCain, also of Arizona, who pundits often referred to as a maverick in the Senate.
Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., delivers remarks on the Senate floor in support of the legislative filibuster, on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022.
"The best part about this take is that there’s no one out there making the case for bipartisanship," added co-host Daniel Pfeiffer, responding to the original Washington Post piece.
Sinema and fellow moderate Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, of West Virginia, broke party ranks last week and voted against abolishing the Senate’s filibuster, as well as against an exception to the filibuster that would have allowed Democrats to pass their voting legislation with a simple majority.
"These bills help treat the symptoms of the disease, but they do not fully address the disease itself," Sinema said at the time. "And while I continue to support these bills, I will not support separate actions that worsen the underlying disease of division affecting our country."
Spokespeople for Sinema did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Neither did the podcast’s production company or Mastromonaco.
"These are the hypocrites who say they are against bullying – whilst being the vilest bullies of all," said Phelim McAleer, an Irish American filmmaker who is currently working on a Hunter Biden biopic who dissected the remarks on his own podcast.
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Separately, in a joint statement with his documentarian partner Ann McElhinney, he called on Mastromonaco to apologize to Sinema.
"So much for being the adults in the room! Isn’t it funny how those who praise ‘civility’ and ‘women's empowerment’ can be the worst at actually empowering women to make their own decisions? Will Alyssa apologize for her vile comments?"
Mastromonaco, 45, served as White House deputy chief of staff for operations under Obama, 2011-2014, and has held media positions at A&E Networks and Vice Media.
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