A Republican congressman filmed for Sacha Baron Cohen's satirical television series, who appeared to back a fictitious scheme to train toddlers to use guns, says that he is the victim of "a sick fraud."
Philip Van Cleave and Erran Morad (Sacha Baron Cohen) promote firearms to toddlers in the Who Is America? satirical television series. Photo: Showtime
California congressman Dana Rohrabacher was one of two Republican politicians filmed for an episode of Who is America?.
The series is for the Showtime channel in which Sacha Baron Cohen assumes personas to satirise US political and cultural life in the era of President Donald Trump.
In the first episode, aired last week, Mr Baron Cohen posed as an Israeli anti-terror expert who asked two US congressmen to support his fictional Israeli program "Kinderguardians" to teach kindergartners how to use guns.
When asked for comment, Mr Rohrabacher said in a statement: "Cohen's people apparently used footage from an interview I submitted to earlier this year for a bogus Israeli television company supposedly celebrating the country's 70th anniversary. In that interview, which was not with Cohen, I spoke broadly of training young people at a responsible age in self-defense.
"At no time did I endorse training toddlers in handling guns. Nor was the idea even presented to me directly. If it had been, I would have rejected it," he said.
"I love good satire, but good satire must reveal some basis in truth. This was fraud, a sick fraud at that, and its intention was to deceive the American people for political purposes."
Republican congressman Dana Rohrabacher says Sacha Baron Cohen's new satirical television series is a 'sick fraud'. Photo: AFP
Mr Rohrabacher did not respond to a request for comment on whether he would take further action.
Republican Joe Wilson of South Carolina and former Senator Trent Lott, who is now a lobbyist at a Washington law firm, were also filmed appearing to lend support to the scheme. Neither Mr Wilson nor Mr Lott replied to requests for comment.
Showtime and Mr Baron Cohen, who has made a comedy career out of pulling pranks on public figures, declined to comment on Mr Rohrabacher's statement.
The seven-episode show marked Mr Baron Cohen's first television project in a decade after he launched his comedy career as a white English rapper Ali G., whose interviewees included Donald Trump and Newt Gingrich. His 2006 faux documentary film "Borat" ridiculed Kazakhstan and Middle Americans.