Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., arrives for a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 15, 2019, for Attorney General nominee William Barr. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

On Monday, Kira Davis wrote about an appallingly snobbish opinion piece written by former USDA research economist Andrew Crane-Droesch criticizing what he says is the Trump administration’s poor treatment of the agency and their decision to move it to Missouri.

In the article, which was published by the Washington Post, Crane-Droesch stated, without evidence, that the department “didn’t need to sit next to a corn field to analyze agricultural policy, and [agriculture secretary Sonny Perdue] knew that.”

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) blasted the piece in a tweet, saying “surely nobody could be that condescending & elitist” to think working in Missouri should be considered “punishment”:

I assume this is a parody, right? DC bureaucrats aren’t actually saying out loud that moving to Missouri is … punishment, are they? Because surely nobody could be that condescending & elitist. https://t.co/TyNT5cXqaQ — Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) October 21, 2019

This legitimate criticism started a bizarre series of tweets that ended up with CNN anchor/journalist Jake Tapper insinuating that Hawley was … an anti-Semite. Here’s how it got started:

Greg Sargent, a longtime blogger who writes for the liberal Plum Line page at the Washington Post, chimed in and snidely responded to Hawley’s tweet about Crane-Droesch’s piece by attacking the person instead of the substance of his argument:

What's really "condescending" here is the sort of smarmy, smirking contempt for people's intelligence that @HawleyMO is displaying. Coming from a leading intellectual light of the new "conservative nationalism," this unmasks the phony pastoral posturing that lies at its core. https://t.co/tMHpkqS2LX — Greg Sargent (@ThePlumLineGS) October 21, 2019

Hawley clapped back, continuing to hammer home the point about liberal elitism, and noting that Sargent basically was proving his point:

Only a smug, rich liberal elitist would say that defending your home is “phony pastoral posturing,” whatever that means. No, Greg, I don’t think living in Missouri is “punishment.” But this is the new left: utter, open contempt for the people of the heartland and all we love https://t.co/0F8e3OZttq — Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) October 21, 2019

Sargent was so fauxfended by Hawley’s remarks to him that he wrote a post at the WaPo explaining how he was right and the Senator was wrong.

Tapper retweeted the piece, and for some reason thought he’d be performing a public service by adding that Sargent was Jewish – which apparently no one knew but him (not even Sargent noted it in his piece):

In which ⁦@HawleyMO⁩ calls a Jewish journalist a “smug, rich liberal elitist” https://t.co/44Mh94mcnO — Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) October 22, 2019

Hawley did not let up in the face of the smear attempt:

For defending my homestate of Missouri, liberal media have called me “phony,” “ugly,” “smarmy,” a racist and now an anti-Semite. All in 24 hrs. This is how they bully those who aren’t part of the DC club. But I don’t care what slurs they use, I will ALWAYS defend Missouri https://t.co/pfUGKEbcv5 — Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) October 22, 2019

Tapper actually thought he was helping himself in a follow-up tweet responding to Hawley, but all he did was insult the intelligence of everyone reading him who knew exactly what he was hinting at with his original tweet:

I didn’t label you anything. I stated a fact. You used those terms to describe a Jewish journalist. Why did you say Greg was “rich”? What is it about him that suggests he’s wealthy? — Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) October 22, 2019

Twitter users, including some who are Jewish, ripped Tapper for making the insinuation Hawley was an anti-Semite:

As a Jew, let me say that your bullshit attempt to paint @HawleyMO as an antisemite is so loathsome and repulsive, it could only come from a @CNN hack. Shame on you. https://t.co/8Gta14cq3U — David Reaboi (@davereaboi) October 22, 2019

This is the kind cheap partisan bs that undermines efforts to stop legitimate anti-Semitic rhetoric. I had no clue that Sargent was Jewish, and I've read him for many years. https://t.co/TxT2t8cpEY — David Harsanyi (@davidharsanyi) October 22, 2019

Wtf Jake? What does him being Jewish have to do with that insult? With so much blatant and actual antisemitism going on across the political spectrum, it’s not helpful to invent dog whistles. Especially when so many people are ignoring bullhorns. — (((AG))) (@AG_Conservative) October 22, 2019

The only person who is associating wealth, smugness, and elite stature with being Jewish is Tapper in this kerfuffle — Matthew Harbison (@mattyharby) October 22, 2019

You're right: no non-Jewish person has ever been called a smug, rich liberal elitist. Even for someone such as yourself, this is pretty hackish. — Physics Geek (@physicsgeek) October 22, 2019

Tapper complained two days ago on his show that prominent Republicans were refusing to go on his show. Maybe this is why. https://t.co/VEHK0Dez56 — Chuck Ross (@ChuckRossDC) October 22, 2019

I should note for the record that one thing Tapper conveniently left out of his tweet about Sargent is that Sargent is actually a liberal opinion writer, not a “journalist” in the sense that Tapper is. Tapper would have you think Hawley was just another Republican attacking a supposedly objective member of the mainstream media for writing something he didn’t like.

Sargent is technically a “journalist” only in the sense that he does original reporting here and there. That’s why the Washington Post lists him as an “opinion writer” instead of a journalist.

Tapper would never refer to a conservative writer as a “journalist” – he’d label them a conservative opinion writer to clue people in on their angle. That he simply referred to Sargent as a “journalist” without noting he was someone who was liberally biased and who typically attacks politicians from that angle was also dishonest by omission.

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— Based in North Carolina, Sister Toldjah is a former liberal and a 16+ year veteran of blogging with an emphasis on media bias, social issues, and the culture wars. Read her Red State archives here. Connect with her on Twitter. –