October 07, 2020 01:11 PM UTC

LISTEN: Cory Gardner at Peak Ridiculousness

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• by: Colorado Pols

Anyone who reads this website or follows Colorado politics in general is well aware that Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Yuma) really has only one political superpower: Obfuscation.

Gardner has mastered the ability of saying many words in a particular order so that the end result is a completely nonsensical response to your question. It doesn’t matter what issue is on the table — Gardner will say nothing about anything, from health care and coronavirus to gun safety and immigration.

Gardner’s powers of obfuscation have begun to fail him in recent years, forcing him to adopt a Plan B that is basically just running away from the questioner. But a new story from The Huffington Post reminds us of Gardner’s abilities when he was still operating at peak ridiculousness:

Facing an uphill battle for reelection in a state where two-thirds of registered voters polled last month said they favored a Senate candidate who promised “aggressive action” on climate change, Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner (R) has billed himself as a “national leader” on climate issues and run three separate ads casting himself as a pragmatic environmentalist.

But in a 2017 audiotape HuffPost obtained, Gardner squirms out of questions about what is causing climate change, instead leaning into conspiratorial thinking that efforts to curb carbon emissions are part of a larger plan to “control the economy.”

“There are people who want to control the economy as a result of their belief about the environment,” Gardner said in a previously unpublished interview with a local newspaper columnist in his native Yuma County in rural eastern Colorado. “Absolutely, there are.”

This 2017 interview with Gardner was conducted by Gregory Hill, a novelist who lives in Gardner’s hometown of Yuma and writes a weekly column for the Yuma Pioneer. The interview has not previously been made public, as Huff Post reports, because Hill was essentially bullied into backing off by Gardner staffers:

Following their testy Tuesday morning call three years ago, Gardner’s team contacted Tony Rayl, the editor of the Yuma Pioneer, to complain about the columnist’s tone and ask whether Hill truly worked for the paper. Hill, who said he is on the autism spectrum and reacts angrily when someone appears to be evading simple questions, was embarrassed at losing his temper.

“I felt like a failure,” he said in a phone call with HuffPost. And in a county of roughly 10,000 people, he didn’t want his mostly conservative neighbors to see him as “the shrill, hysterical version of the liberal that they already have in their mind.”

The senator’s staffers reinforced that feeling. “It felt like this intimidation thing that worked,” Hill said. “It worked on me more than anybody.” So the interview didn’t run in 2017.

Gardner’s office did not respond to HuffPost’s request for comment.

We’d encourage you to listen to the entire exchange, which is embedded below, to get the full flavor of Gardner’s obfuscation. You can practically hear his shit-eating grin in excruciating back-and-forth dances like this one:

“I certainly think that the climate is changing,” Gardner said.

“I’ve heard you say that before,” Hill responded. “But here’s my question: Is it changing as a consequence of the human introduction of carbon dioxide and other carbon compounds into our atmosphere?”

“Well, I don’t think there’s any doubt that humans have an impact on the environment around us,” Gardner said.

Hill grew audibly frustrated. “Let’s be clear, because when I step outside and exhale, I’m having an impact on the environment. But are humans essentially causing climate change?”

“I think that humans do have an impact on the environment,” Gardner repeated.

Take a listen, and make sure to stick around until the end when Hill replies cheekily, “Well, maybe I’ll see you at a town hall, then.”