The White House isn’t backing down from utilizing the phrase “MAGA” to tie congressional Republicans to former President Trump, even after a authorities watchdog company instructed officers it violated the Hatch Act.

In a memo despatched out late Thursday, slamming the Republican Study Committee’s fiscal funds White House spokesperson Andrew Bates described it as “an extreme MAGA plan.”

It’s the identical language that obtained White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre into hassle earlier this week.

The Office of the Special Counsel accused Ms. Jean-Pierre of operating afoul of the Hatch Act, which limits federal workers from participating in sure political actions to forestall influencing elections.

As the OSC sees it, Ms. Jean-Pierre violated the Hatch Act in November when she referred to “MAGA Republican officials who don’t believe in the rule of law” and made different disparaging Republican candidates.

“Because Ms. Jean-Pierre made the statements while acting in her official capacity, she violated the Hatch Act prohibition against using her official authority to influence for the purpose of interfering with or affecting the result of an election,” Ana Galindo-Marrone, who leads the company’s Hatch Act Unit, wrote in a letter Wednesday.

The letter was issued in response to a Hatch Act criticism filed by Protect the Public’s Trust, a conservative watchdog group.

Ms. Jean-Pierre responded to the allegation by saying the White House didn’t understand it had violated the Hatch Act.

“The opinion that was presented by OSC happened just last week, which is – it occurred months after the briefing where I made those comments. So, basically, it is retroactive,” she added. “We did not know their opinion when we were given the green light to say the comments that I made,” she mentioned on the day by day press briefing.

Ms. Jean-Pierre additionally mentioned that the Trump administration used MAGA to explain “policies or official agendas” almost 2,000 instances, including the Congressional Republicans additionally steadily used the phrase. 

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