Actor Jon Stewart got into a screaming match with political commentator Jack Posobiec outside of the U.S. Capitol on Monday.
Footage of their screaming match surfaced on social media as members of the public, press and the two men’s personal teams surrounded them. It’s unclear what caused the exact breakdown in communication, but in a later video, Stewart said that he felt he was being trolled by Posobiec.
At one point in an earlier video, Stewart got up close and personal with Posobiec. “These people have suffered for fifteen years because you’re a fucking troll. You’re a troll. Not in good faith. You’re not in good faith,” Stewart screamed at Posobiec.
I’m here in DC with @jonstewart and @GruntStyle1SG with a message about helping the veterans pic.twitter.com/fdIvBSkRG7
— Jack Posobiec 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) August 1, 2022
“Jon Stewart and I have decided to come to an agreement, have we not, Jon?” Posobiec asked Stewart in the third video. (RELATED: Jon Stewart Comes To Rogan’s Defense Again, Compares Media Attacks To Iraq War Opposition)
“Yes sir. I lost my temper a little bit. I felt like I was being trolled. I realized that the important thing is, just gotta get this done for these guys and get them over the finish line to get the healthcare they need,” Stewart responded. Stewart was joined by GruntStyle Co-Owner Tim Jenson to support the passage of the bill. Jenson also engaged in the screaming match with Posobiec, but later reconciled.
“I’m glad that Jon Stewart was willing to put aside politics and eventually come to the table with me,” Posobiec told the Daily Caller. “This is about veterans, not how many retweet[s] we can get.”
Stewart is reportedly in Washington, D.C., to support the Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics (PACT) Act, which would expand healthcare coverage for veterans who were exposed to toxins and burn pits while serving the country. The Honoring Our PACT Act passed the upper chamber in June, but 25 Republicans switched their votes to oppose the bill, which prevented the bill from reaching 60 votes and clearing a filibuster.
Many Democrats, such as Democratic Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy, claimed that Republicans switched their vote out of spite toward Democrats poised to pass climate change legislation.
Republican Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey voted against the legislation in June and introduced an amendment that would convert mandatory spending to discretionary spending. Under the amendment, the language in the bill would evolve from “such sums are necessary” for “the delivery of veteran’s health care,” “expenses incident to the delivery” and “medical and other research,” to $116.6 billion in “direct spending.”
Without Toomey’s amendment, the Honoring Our PACT Act would add almost $400 billion in mandatory spending, which Toomey’s office claimed “will be filled with spending totally unrelated to veterans.”
“It’s wrong to use a veterans bill to hide a $400 billion unrelated slush fund. The Senate could have fixed this weeks ago, and we can still fix it now. We can very quickly amend the PACT Act to remove this budget gimmick without reducing spending on veterans in the underlying bill by a single penny,” Toomey said in a statement to the Daily Caller.
