Republicans are terrified of what Special Counsel Robert Mueller may be discovering about Donald Trump’s dealings with Russia and other unsavory characters, so they keep trying to discredit Mueller and his investigation with claims of partisanship.

But one of those GOP Trump defenders got his ass handed to him during an appearance on the Fox show Outnumbered Monday afternoon.

Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-NY) began by saying the Department of Justice has a conflict of interest when it comes to investigations:

“It’s hard to expect the (Department of Justice) and FBI to investigate themselves.”

Co-host Harris Faulkner quickly offered a retort to Zeldin:

“Yeah, but they’re set up to do that, right?”

Instead of responding, Zeldin again tried to distract from the real issue:

“You can’t even compare it to anything else in the history of these agencies where it was this bad.

“You have a special counsel investigating the president for winning the election, without any evidence and any crime.”

And that’s when host Jessica Tarlov used the nuclear weapon of truth to cut right through Zeldin’s talking points and bullshit:

“Congressman, it’s a little more than just now. He’s looking into financial issues, obstruction of justice and collusion — that’s the scope. It’s a three-pronged scope: financial, collusion and obstruction of justice. That’s what’s doing on here. I’m not just investigating the president for winning.”

Donald Trump isn’t being investigated for winning the election. He’s being investigated for the way in which he won and the very real possibility that he was helped by a foreign government that decided to subvert the will of the American voters and install their own handpicked puppet as leader of the United States.

While we can certainly debate the specifics of what we currently know regarding the 2016 election, the evidence so far clearly seems to suggest that Trump was helped to victory by Russia and the efforts of people directly linked to the Kremlin. That alone should give pause to every single American.

But for people like Congressman Zeldin, Trump can do no wrong, and even if he did, that’s fine as long as his party was the winner. It’s tempting to call Zeldin a hack and even a traitor, but neither of those titles seems adequate.