Tulsi Gabbard says Jussie Smollett 'spit in the face of real victims of bigotry' and should receive maximum sentence as 'warning' for 'future hoaxers'

Former U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard on Tuesday said convicted hate-crime hoaxer Jussie Smollett "spit in the face of real victims of bigotry" by "lying about being attacked because of his race" and "should be sentenced to the fullest extent of the law to serve as an example and to send a very strong message to anyone who thinks about pulling a hoax like this in the future."

What else did Gabbard say?

The Democrat from Hawaii offered her take in a TikTok video she posted to her Twitter account and added that Smollett has "rightly been found guilty by a jury of his peers" and "needs to apologize to the American people" for "what he did."

In the text of her Twitter post, Gabbard said Smollett's actions were a "slap in the face of actual victims of bigotry" and that a maximum sentence would serve as a "warning to potential future hoaxers."

Smollett was convicted last week of felony disorderly conduct for faking a hate crime against himself in Chicago in January 2019 and lying to law enforcement about it.

Predictably, Hollywood leftists remained silent about the embarrassment Smollett's guilty verdicts on five of six counts brought to their ranks.

But Gabbard isn't from Tinseltown, and she's not a leftist. In fact, Gabbard has been outspoken for quite a while with views that easily could be construed as more Republican and conservative than Democratic and liberal:

• Last month she blasted prosecutors in the Kyle Rittenhouse murder trial, saying they were "motivated by politics" as they went after the young defendant — and that their actions "should be considered criminal." Rittenhouse testified he acted in self defense when he fatally shot two men and seriously wounded another amid rioting in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in August 2020. He was found not guilty on all counts.
• Also in November Gabbard celebrated Republican Glenn Youngkin's win over Democratic candidate Terry McAuliffe in the Virginia gubernatorial election as "a victory for all Americans. Why? Because it was a resounding rejection of efforts to divide us by race, the stripping of parental rights, and arrogant, deaf leaders. This benefits us all."
• In September, she compared President Joe Biden — a fellow Democrat whom she's called her friend — to an "autocrat" for attacking border patrol agents who were falsely accused of abusing Haitian migrants.
• In May Gabbard said Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot — another fellow Democrat — should resign after granting interviews only to journalists and reporters of color.