Sen. Katie Britt (R-Ala.) isn’t backing down after key elements of an alarming story she told in her response to President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address fell apart over the weekend.
In her televised speech following Biden’s address last week, Britt misleadingly used an account from a sex trafficking victim to criticize Biden’s border policies, even though the woman whose abuse she described was trafficked only in Mexico and a decade before Biden became president.
“We wouldn’t be OK with this happening in a third-world country,” Britt said in her speech, which has been roundly criticized from both the left and the right. “This is the United States of America, and it is past time, in my opinion, that we start acting like it. President Biden’s border policies are a disgrace. This crisis is despicable.”
The woman, Karla Jacinto Romero, told CNN on Sunday that Britt had misused and misrepresented her experience to score political points. She said it was “not fair” and noted Britt did not reach out for permission to use her story in a political speech.
Britt, however, insisted that the media was to blame for the whole thing — and argued that her critics were missing her broader point about the tragedy of human trafficking on the U.S.-Mexico border.
“The liberal media isn’t interested in the truth. They’re interested in burying the truth about Joe Biden and his border crisis. When all the facts come out, people will see the truth,” Britt said in a podcast interview hosted by fellow GOP Sen. Ted Cruz.
The Alabama Republican also joked about the brutal response to her speech’s delivery, which was criticized for being overly dramatic. NBC’s “Saturday Night Live” parodied her over the weekend, with actor Scarlett Johansson portraying her as a “scary mom” and the “craziest bitch in the Target parking lot.”
“I am literally in the stories from the top to the bottom [of news sites]. You would have thought I would have been better off behav[ing] like some of our colleagues that are indicted for something or had said something outrageous,” Britt said on the podcast.
“My crime was putting too much passion into issues that I genuinely care about, and they slaughtered me across the airwaves,” she added, expressing appreciation for the drama engulfing the British royal family this week for finally bumping her off the front pages.
“Kate Middleton saved me with her PhotoShop,” Britt quipped.