At a recent campaign rally, conservative pundit Laura Ingraham suggested the sending House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), rather than five Guantanamo detainees, to Afghanistan in exchange for an American service member held as a prisoner of war.
“I was thinking about this prisoner swap. I kind of wish that President Obama would have thought this through a little bit more. Instead of sending five Taliban MVPs over there, he could have just traded one Eric Cantor,” Ingraham said at a rally in support of Cantor primary challenger David Brat.
Citing his ostensible support for some immigration reform proposals, the anti-immigrant movement has targeted Cantor in recent months. Ingraham has used her platform as a prominent conservative media personality to amplify the this criticism. Ingraham has also been a vocal proponent of the Federation for American Immigration Reform’s (FAIR) so-called “anti-amnesty” pledge. David Brat has signed the aforementioned pledge in advance of Virginia’s June 10 primary. So far, a significant majority of candidates that have signed FAIR’s pledge have failed to win in primary elections.