GOP Rep. Riley Moore (R-WV) spoke at the Nixon Foundation’s annual Grand Strategy Summit this week in Washington, D.C., and said of the former President: “Richard Nixon was absolutely couped out of office and was framed. All of this was fake.”
Moore added, “We now know more about the deep state and its power, and its ability to literally change things at the top. President Trump faced this in his first term with the fake Russia collusion hoax and all that.”
Moore then claimed that Nixon “knew all of this, he knew it, and he stayed quiet about it because he didn’t want to erode the confidence of the American people in our system of governance and our institutions.”
[NOTE: Moore, who is the nephew of U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), is running for re-election this year against Democrat Ace Parsi.]
What is happening? Nixon’s corruption is about as well-established any government corruption of the last 100 years. https://t.co/8hH0yBlUqm
— David French (@DavidAFrench) October 2, 2026
Conservative political pundits are responding with disbelief. The New York Times columnist David French replied on social media, “What is happening? Nixon’s corruption is about as well-established any government corruption of the last 100 years.”
Veteran conservative legal expert Gregg Nunziata, executive director of Society for the Rule of Law, reposted French’s post.
Of course Democrats disagree with Moore’s take, too. Christopher Hale, who helped lead national Catholic outreach for President Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign, replied, “Trying to cover up their own wrongdoings by preempting it by covering up Nixon’s.”
Podcaster Stan Mitchell responded, “Watching the rewriting of history in real time has really been something else.”
And MS Now’s Ron Insana replied, about Nixon, “His own party asked him to step down amid testimony from his own cabinet and lawyers, broadcast on live television, of abuse of power, illegal campaign contributions and other well-documented misdeeds.”
At the Nixon Foundation summit, Moore cited The New York Times op-ed written in February by Newsmax’s chief White House correspondent James Rosen, and suggested that it backs up his claims about Nixon being framed by the “deep state.”
When libertarian Jeffrey Tucker, founder and president of the Brownstone Institute, amplified Rosen’s article and wrote: “Nixon was the victim of a deep-state plot so complex and enormous he could not fathom it. Trump is smarter: purging his enemies before they purge him,” President Trump reposted it.
Thank you, @POTUS @realDonaldTrump, for reposting on Truth Social my February 8 @nytimes article about #Watergate and the Deep State plot against President Nixon. I stand ready to answer any questions you may have. #historymatters pic.twitter.com/gtxzBrpwOS
— James Rosen (@JamesRosenTV) March 2, 2026
[NOTE: Rosen concluded the article with a Nixon/Trump comparison and wrote: “They differ in two crucial respects. Trump’s purge of the federal government since returning to the presidency has displayed a ruthlessness toward the perceived ‘enemy within’ that Nixon, despite similar inclinations, could never conjure — even when faced with criminal insubordination…Trump also appears on track to complete his second term.”]