House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has called for a criminal investigation into Rep. Paul Gosar over an obvious parody meme that the congressman posted on Twitter.
The 81-year-old congresswoman also called for the House Ethics Committee to investigate the meme.
In the video, Gosar's head is on Attack on Titan character Eren Yaeger's body from the opening credits of the first season of the show. The congressman fights characters with Democratic New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and President Joe Biden's faces edited onto them.
"Threats of violence against Members of Congress and the President of the United States must not be tolerated," Pelosi tweeted. She added that House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy should "join in condemning this horrific video and call on the Ethics Committee and law enforcement to investigate." Threats of violence against Members of Congress and the President of the United States must not be tolerated. @GOPLeader should join in condemning this horrific video and call on the Ethics Committee and law enforcement to investigate. https://t.co/qX8kMbiZ8n
— Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) November 9, 2021
Editing the heads of others onto characters from film and television clips is a popular meme format that really took off during the 2016 election.
Ocasio-Cortez responded to the meme by tweeting "so while I was en route to Glasgow, a creepy member I work with who fundraises for Neo-Nazi groups shared a fantasy video of him killing me." She went on to complain that "institutions don't protect woc," meaning "women of color." So while I was en route to Glasgow, a creepy member I work with who fundraises for Neo-Nazi groups shared a fantasy video of him killing me
And he’ll face no consequences bc @GOPLeader cheers him on with excuses.
Fun Monday! Well, back to work bc institutions don’t protect woc https://t.co/XRnMAKsnNO
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) November 9, 2021
After the Washington Post published an article complaining about the meme, Twitter disabled likes and retweets citing their "hateful conduct policy." It has since been removed entirely.
Before being removed, the video had been viewed over one million times and had nearly 20,000 "likes."
Rep. Gosar responded to the outrage over the meme with another one.
— Rep. Paul Gosar, DDS (@RepGosar) November 9, 2021
You can watch the clip here if you missed it:
Timcast has reached out to Gosar for comment and will update this story if one is provided.
