When Donald Trump’s numerous connections to white supremacists, his promotion of their tweets, and his endorsements from racists like the head of the American Nazi Party and former KKK leader David Duke are pointed out, Trump’s apologists are very quick to scream “guilt by association!” Trump doesn’t have any responsibility for these associations, they claim.

But when the father of the Orlando night club shooter attended Hillary Clinton’s rally in Kissimmee, Florida, last night, the entire right wing noise machine went into freakout mode.

And this, folks, really is a case of guilt by association, since Mateen was not invited and the event was open to the public.

Cameras captured Seddique Mateen, Omar Mateen’s father, standing in the crowd. He later told a reporter for WPTV, a Palm Beach-based NBC affiliate, that he wanted to attend the rally as a member of the public and a Clinton supporter.

“Why should they be surprised? I love the United States, and I’ve been living here a long time,” Mateen said.

The Clinton campaign said that the rally was a 3,000-person, open-door event for the public. “This individual wasn’t invited as a guest and the campaign was unaware of his attendance until after the event,” the campaign said.

Note that Seddique Mateen himself has not been charged with any crimes in connection to his son’s horrible act; so this is actually a case of double guilt by association, smearing Clinton with Mateen’s attendance and smearing Mateen with his son’s crime.

But that doesn’t stop the wingnut media from pitching a gigantic fit, and blatantly distorting the facts to do it.

Here are two examples out of the deluge of hyperbolic nonsense being pumped out by right wing media and blogs today.

Hack propagandist Kyle Olson (who was also apparently the source of a recent deliberately misleading story about Hillary Clinton’s health) says: Clinton campaign scrambles, claims Seddique not invited to rally - he disagrees.

Really? He “disagrees” and says he was personally invited by the campaign? Well, no — he said very clearly he got an email invitation from the Clinton campaign, like millions of other people who signed up for the list, announcing the rally and inviting the public to attend. But in right wing Bizarro World, Mateen “dodged” the question.

He dodged answering whether the Clinton campaign knew he was going to be attending and if they placed him behind the candidate. But he did say he received an invitation.

“I was invited by the Democratic Party,” he told the news station because he is a member. “It’s a democratic party, so everyone can join.”

And of course, Jim Hoft, the fabled Stupidest Man on the Internet, also jumped on this story — and blatantly lied about it: Seddique Mateen - Father of Pulse Club Islamist Killer - Spotted at Hillary’s FL Speech Behind Stage (VIDEO)

The campaign placed Seddique behind hillary in the stands during her talk yesterday in Florida.

Note that Hoft links to this article at WPTV that actually includes the campaign’s statement that they didn’t invite Mateen and didn’t know he was there:

An official with the Clinton campaign said, “The rally was a 3,000-person, open-door event for the public. This individual wasn’t invited as a guest and the campaign was unaware of his attendance until after the event.”

So once again, Jim Hoft is knowingly pushing an outright lie to his audience of far right knuckle-draggers. It’s far from the first time.

The unspoken implication behind these distorted posts is that Hillary Clinton deliberately put the murderer’s father in the stands behind her, because she’s a terrorist sympathizer. And you don’t have to go very far into the comments for any right wing site to find people saying this out loud.

Just another day of distortions and dishonesty for the captains of right wing journalism.