Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) tried the old Republican trick of blaming Democrats for something they didn’t actually do, only to be called out and forced to backtrack.

In their continued desperation to blame Democrats for rising crime rates, Republicans are now apparently blaming Democrats for laws passed by GOP majorities in the House and Senate and signed by Donald Trump.

The First Step Act is a law that has ushered in long overdue criminal justice reform in the United States by changing minimum sentencing laws and reducing the prison population. However, Cotton tried blaming it and Democrats for the rise in violent crimes.

“It’s your party who voted in lockstep for the First Step Act, that let thousands of violent felons on the street who have now committed innumerable violent crimes,” Cotton claimed on the Senate floor.

Ironically, Cotton failed to recall that Trump supporters tried to violently overthrow democracy just over a year ago and the fact that their policies tend to support violence, especially gun violence and violence toward women and ethnic groups.

Anyway, Senator Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) gave Cotton a history lesson.

“The First Step Act, the Republicans were in the majority!” Durbin reminded Cotton. “It was a bill sponsored by Senators Grassley, Durbin, Lee, and many others! And who signed it into law? Donald Trump signed it into law, the so-called Democratic measure!”

Indeed, the law was passed by the House and Senate, both of which were controlled by Republicans in 2018 before Democrats took majority control of the House the next year. Trump signed the bill in December 2018.

It should also be pointed out that red states, including Cotton’s own Arkansas, top the list of states with the highest homicide rate. Republicans like Cotton are projecting when they blame Democrats for the crime rate. One would think the “law and order” party would have the lowest rates, but they do not.

Cotton then had to admit his humiliating error.

“Yes, it’s true that President Trump signed the First Step Act,” he said. “It was the worst mistake of the Trump administration. Yes, it’s true that a number of Republican senators voted for it — they were wrong.”

Here’s the video via YouTube:

Cotton’s glaring error demonstrates how desperate Republicans are to blame Democrats for everything, just like how Fox News hosts are trying to blame President Joe Biden for protests that occurred in the summer of 2020 when Trump was still president. It’s pathetic.

Featured Image: Screenshot