A conservative commentator drew laughter from other panelists after twice attempting to defend President Donald Trump's latest attacks on his political adversaries.

A senior official in the Department of Justice has directed federal prosecutors around the country to investigate a group funded by billionaire Democratic donor George Soros, a longtime bogeyman to conservatives who Trump has said belongs in prison, and Rob Bluey, executive editor of The Heritage Foundation's Daily Signal website, justified the move on "CNN This Morning."

"I think when you see the writing on the bullets in the Charlie Kirk assassination and the attack on on the ICE facility this week, there are legitimate questions that are being raised or why are these shooters putting these messages, these cryptic messages sometimes, and what do they mean exactly?" Bluey said. "So not only do you have the president making this move from the White House, but you also have Congressman Chip Roy in the U.S. Congress who wants to form a select committee to do an investigation. So I'm all for investigating and trying to get to the bottom of this."

Host Audie Cornish asked what the Texas Republican congressman was trying to investigate, and Bluey was happy to explain.

"Chip Roy, he wants to form a select committee to look into what he calls anti-American activities that are happening on our own soil," Bluey said, and was immediately interrupted by laughter from his fellow panelists.

New York Times podcaster Lulu Garcia-Navarro stepped up to point out that Roy's request for a select committee to investigate what he calls anti-American ideology sounded similar to the infamous House Un-American Activities Committee that former senator Joseph McCarthy exploited to persecute alleged communists in the 1950s.

"Anti-American, actually – interesting, anti-American," Garcia-Navarro said. "Does that not bring back a happy memories of the past?"

Bluey stammered as he tried to regain his footing.

"You brought up George Soros earlier, and I think the reason that Trump is looking at Soros is he has funded a lot of prosecutorial races in this country for individuals who have what the right would say gone easy on criminals," Bluey argued.

Vox podcaster Noel King argued that the conservative U.S. Supreme Court paved the way for Soros to fund any candidate he wanted in its landmark 2010 decision in the Citizens United case, which ruled the government cannot restrict political spending.

"He's an he's an American billionaire," King said. "That is his right, we made this decision in Citizens United. We said money belongs in politics. George Soros is playing the same game as every other billionaire in America."

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