Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) posted a performance piece on Sunday — wringing her hands as she blamed the recently-ended government shutdown on President Donald Trump and claimed that he had almost single-handedly ruined Thanksgiving because of it — and got an impromptu review from actress and filmmaker Justine Bateman.
Murray, who voted to keep the government closed — and thus deprive millions of Americans of their food stamp (SNAP) benefits — more than a dozen times, claimed that Trump and Republicans were taking major steps to deprive families of food assistance as the holidays approached. Her main point of contention appeared to be the fact that President Trump had refused to override her vote — and the votes of a majority of Democrats — and do what they would not do, and she insisted that he was the real reason families were being made to suffer.
WATCH:
It’s nearly Thanksgiving and everyone should remember that Trump fought all the way to the Supreme Court to deny families SNAP benefits this month.
All of this after Trump & Republicans passed the largest cuts to SNAP in HISTORY this summer.
It’s fundamentally immoral. pic.twitter.com/tiDol5wegG
— Senator Patty Murray (@PattyMurray) November 24, 2025
“It’s nearly Thanksgiving and everyone should remember that Trump fought all the way to the Supreme Court to deny families SNAP benefits this month. All of this after Trump & Republicans passed the largest cuts to SNAP in HISTORY this summer. It’s fundamentally immoral,” she said.
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Bateman chimed in with her review, addressing everything from the actress and her demeanor to the staging and the setting chosen for the video.
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#SocialMediaVideoCritique
Per: @sunnylohmann
– There are many unfortunate issues with this piece.
– The actress appears to be at once under-rehearsed, and also weary of the task of performing.
– Careful casting is a must when a project has an exacting director. The impression… https://t.co/DlAxrq3NyE— Justine Bateman (@JustineBateman) November 25, 2025
“There are many unfortunate issues with this piece,” Bateman began, starting in on Murray immediately. “The actress appears to be at once under-rehearsed, and also weary of the task of performing. Careful casting is a must when a project has an exacting director.”
“The impression given here is that the director’s efforts to elicit a proper performance caused the actress to check out during her takes,” Bateman continued. “The resulting dialogue delivery is halting. Awkward pauses within the compound word ‘Thanksgiving’ and before some prepositions are perhaps an effort by the actress to sabotage the piece itself.”
When she’d finished with the actress and her awkward delivery, Bateman turned her attention to the staging of the shot — and some of the issues that a good camera operator would certainly have noticed before making the film public.
“The utilitarian lighting appears to have been applied hastily and implies a parking garage or other industrial settings,” she noted. “The camera frame is vertical with some hazy video filled in at the sides. Avoid this at all costs. This implies an amateur effort. Properly orient your camera horizontally.”
“Finally, the setting is extremely distracting. The first impression is that the actress is standing in a bathroom stall. The low wall on her left as the semi-private partition. The orange object on the floor appears to be a toilet with closed toilet seat cover,” Bateman concluded. “The silver pipe on the wall suggests an old-fashioned flush system, where the tank is installed above. And the red box serving as the ‘flush’ button.”
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