Yesterday, before Democrat Doug Jones beat Republican child predator Roy Moore in the Alabama Senate election, we were entertained by an idiot spokesperson for Moore on CNN. Ted Crockett, said spokesperson, was talking to Jake Tapper, trying to defend Moore’s view that Muslims shouldn’t be allowed to serve in congress.
When Tapper asked why Muslims should’t be able to serve, Crockett said, “Because you have to swear on the Bible. You have to swear on a Bible to be an elected official in the United States of America. He alleges that a Muslim cannot do that, ethically, swearing on the Bible.”
“You don’t actually have to swear on a Christian Bible,” Tapper said. “You can swear on anything, really. I don’t know if you knew that.”
“Oh no, I swore on the Bible. I’ve done it three times,” Crockett said, as if because he chose to swear on the Bible, swearing on the Bible is the law.
Tapper patiently explained to Crockett, “I’m sure you have. I’m sure you’ve picked up a Bible, but the law is not that you have to swear on a Christian Bible. That is not the law.”
At this point Crockett was so befuddled he just stared blankly, mouth agape, for much too long of a time on live TV. The dead air was almost as dead as the look on his face.
Finally Tapper broke the silence. “You didn’t know that?”
Crockett still stared blankly, before sputtering, “I don’t know. I know that Donald Trump did it when we made him president.”
“Because he’s a Christian and he picked it,” Tapper said, and then quickly ended the interview.
According to The Washington Post:
Crockett appeared to be referencing a commentary Moore wrote in 2006 in which he argued “Islamic law is simply incompatible with our law” and urged Congress to bar Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), who was elected that year, from taking the congressional oath of office.
Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, took a ceremonial oath with a Koran once owned by Thomas Jefferson.
Tapper noted that nothing in the Constitution nor any law requires elected officials to be sworn in on a Bible. Article VI of the Constitution explicitly prohibits a religious test for public office.
Newly elected members of Congress typically take the oath together on the first day of a new session, and religious texts are not a formal part of the mass swearing-in.