House GOP forms circular firing squad over their epic failures

Posted on February 7, 2024 by Mark Sumner

On Tuesday, things went so wrong for Republicans that the level of their dysfunction became the focus of the story. At Fox News, Steve Doocy was busy dressing down House Majority Whip Tom Emmer for his role in throwing away a border security bill that is the best Republicans might ever get. Meanwhile, The New York Times was reporting that “dysfunction reigns in Congress” as the Republican majority in the House showed an incredible ability to lose its way with a “humiliating series of setbacks.”

Whatever Emmer was whipping, it wasn’t votes.

Now Republicans need someone to blame for those failures. Like all parties that revolve around a single authoritarian leader, the most important thing is not to fall under the baleful glare of the Eye of Donald Trump. And the best way to do that is … to point the finger at someone else.

After Republicans’ failure to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene made a bid to blame Democrats because Rep. Al Green turned up to vote in a wheelchair when Republicans thought they had safely scheduled this vote at a time when Green couldn’t appear due to emergency surgery.

Greene: Democrats hid one of their members trying to throw us off on the numbers pic.twitter.com/8Da16eNJcj
— Acyn (@Acyn) February 7, 2024

But blaming everything on the old hidden Democrat trick was not enough for others. Rep. Greg Steube went on Newsmax to point at a Republican absence—House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, who had the audacity to be out for cancer treatment. “If Scalise would have been here … the bill would have passed,” Steube said.

There were claims overnight that Scalise would return for a Wednesday vote, though his office said otherwise. Dragging Scalise out of cancer treatment so that Republicans can squeak out a sham impeachment with a one-vote margin would be a top entry in the annals of both cruelty and pathos.

Other Republicans widened the scope of their blame to take in the whole of Republican leadership in the House, which led to one of the strangest aspects of a strange day: nostalgia for former Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

“Getting rid of Speaker McCarthy has officially turned into an unmitigated disaster,” tweeted Rep. Thomas Massie. “All work on separate spending bills has ceased. Spending reductions have been traded for spending increases. Warrantless spying has been temporarily extended. Our majority has shrunk.”

Massie wasn’t the only Republican suddenly longing for the Golden Age of Kevin, but the irony meter had to be definitively fried by this statement from Rep. Matt Gaetz.

"I also wonder, wouldn't it have been nice to still have Kevin McCarthy in the House of Representatives," Gaetz said on Newsmax. "Never thought you'd hear me say that."

Is that even irony? Irony squared? Irony times hypocrisy over the reciprocal of karma?

Whatever it was, Gaetz went on to blame McCarthy for getting rid of former Rep. George Santos. This definitely did not happen, since Santos was expelled two months after Gaetz engineered the ouster of McCarthy from the speaker’s chair.

Still, Santos sent Republicans a little something to remember him by in their moment of darkness.

Miss me yet? pic.twitter.com/sw4j7VcjJk
— George Santos (@MrSantosNY) February 6, 2024

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson kept it simple: He blamed everyone but himself. "I don't think this is a reflection on the leader,” Johnson told reporters. “It's a reflection on the body itself." Sure. That’ll do it.

Following the loss on impeaching Mayorkas, one senior Republican aide was pushing a hard line, writing, “If we lose the Israel vote after losing Mayorkas impeachment: VACATE.”

Then they lost the vote on Israel.

Rep. Mike Gallagher grabbed a pen for a Wall Street Journal op-ed on Wednesday, to take a swipe at every Republican in Congress who voted to impeach Mayorkas. “Impeachment not only would fail to resolve Mr. Biden’s border crisis,” wrote Gallagher, “but would also set a dangerous new precedent that would be used against future Republican administrations.”

But Gallagher was alone in trying to stop the bleeding. The remainder of the caucus had their eyes firmly fixed on what’s important: pleasing Donald Trump. After all, Trump doesn’t want issues at the southern border solved; he wants them front and center in the fall election. And in that cause, congressional Republicans are fully prepared to humiliate themselves all over again today, and tomorrow, to infinity and beyond.

As The New York Times reports, Republicans thought they had set a trap for Democrats on the border issue, one that would give them a potent issue for the fall and powerful leverage to get policies they wanted. But Democrats “tripped them up,” in the Times’ words, by giving Republicans unexpected concessions on border security and tying it to military assistance for Ukraine.

Now Republicans are scurrying to explain how what they demanded is the wrong thing all along. Congress is flailing, multiple issues get ignored in the storm of finger-pointing, and no one wants to name the person primarily responsible for this mess.

Because that person is Trump. And if Republicans have to burn down their own house and throw their friends under buses to make Trump happy … just line up those buses.

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Republicans demanded border security, worked on a compromise deal with Democrats, and now want to blow the whole thing up. Biden is promising to remind Americans every day that the Republican Party is at fault for the lack of solutions to the problems they claim are most important.

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Scalise’s bid for speaker on shaky ground

Posted on October 12, 2023 by Joan McCarter

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise didn’t have much of a chance to celebrate Wednesday after he eked out a win to be the Republican nominee for speaker. The votes had barely been counted before the opposition began making itself loudly heard—and in numbers that could deny him the job. That wasn’t what Scalise counted on, of course. He seemed to assume, like former Speaker Kevin McCarthy before him, that once he got the nod, the conference would fall in behind him and he could bulldoze his way to a floor vote. Also, like McCarthy, he seriously underestimated the absolute love of chaos in his party. But unlike McCarthy, who had weeks to lobby support for his bid, Scalise has had days.

Scalise’s narrow victory of 113 votes to Rep. Jim Jordan’s 99 was made even smaller when it became clear that three of his votes came from the congressional delegates from U.S. territories who won’t be allowed to vote in the floor election. Effectively, he’s starting with 110 votes and needs to turn 107 people to his side. Punchbowl News puts the “real hard-core ‘Never Scalise’ vote” at between 20 and 30, ranging from a core group of moderates who are still pissed that McCarthy was forced out, to the very far-right fringes of the party.

Because they are Republicans, some opposition is petty and personal. Like Rep. George Santos of New York, who was hit with the news of 23 more felony counts in the federal indictment against him while the speaker vote was happening. Scalise hasn’t personally reached out to him, Santos tweeted, and so he said that “ANYONE but Scalise and come hell or high water I won’t change my mind.”

Then there’s Freedom Caucus stalwart Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, who is still mad that his big idea for a new rule failed. He pushed a rule requiring that the nominee had to have 217 votes in the GOP conference to move to the floor. It went to a vote and was rejected 135-88, but he blames Scalise and his allies anyway. Thus he’s a “hard no.”

So is Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina, who says she just discovered that Scalise “attended a white supremacist conference and also compared himself to David Duke.” Mace remains unperturbed by the allegations that the guy she’s backing, Jordan, turned a blind eye to the sexual abuse of multiple young men while he was a wrestling coach at Ohio State University. She even went on CNN to tell a dumbfounded Jake Tapper that Jordan was the guy to build bridges to Democrats.

On the other hand, some of the people who brought down McCarthy are backing Scalise, including Reps. Matt Rosendale of Montana, Eli Crane of Arizona, Tim Burchett of Tennessee, and yes, Matt Gaetz of Florida. What, if anything, Scalise has promised them we don’t know yet. We do know he told Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida that he was with her on her top priorities: “1. Defunding Jack Smith 2. Impeachment vote for Biden on floor of House 3. Subpoena for Hunter Biden.”

Of course, that Scalise is relying on those people for support shows just how shaky this venture is for him. He’s also not expected to get any help from Donald Trump, which makes Scalise’s MAGA support even more questionable. The people he needs to rely on to help him herd these rattlesnakes all seem to be preoccupied with the fight for their own climb up the leadership ladder.

What happens next, and when it happens, is unclear at the moment. The House convenes in the early afternoon but will probably immediately go into recess. The Republican conference is meeting privately again at 12:15 PM ET. A vote Thursday seems unlikely.

Sign the petition: No to MAGA impeachment. Focus on what matters.

Speaker race preview: ‘Legislative terrorist’ Jordan vs. ‘David Duke without the baggage’ Scalise

Rep. George Santos faces new charges he stole donor IDs, made unauthorized charges to their credit cards

Republican congresswoman gets a reality check while defending Jim Jordan

Former OSU wrestlers: Jim Jordan ‘has to answer for what happened to us’

Posted on October 11, 2023 by Joan McCarter

“Do you really want a guy in that job who chose not to stand up for his guys?” That’s what Ohio State University wrestler Mike Schyck told NBC News about Rep. Jim Jordan, the former assistant coach who allegedly stood by in silence while his charges were being sexually abused by team doctor Richard Strauss.

A group of the former student-athletes is speaking out about Jordan once again, because he was put forward as a viable candidate to be speaker of the House—second in line to the presidency. They think he should be nowhere near the job. It looks as though a slim majority of House Republicans might agree. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise narrowly got the nod from his fellow GOP members Wednesday, ahead of what could be another drawn-out and bruising fight on the floor. Nevertheless, in today’s MAGA-dominated Republican Party, Jordan was able to rise to these heights and be a contender for the job.

That’s why former student-athletes are speaking out.

Jordan’s “hypocrisy is unbelievable,” said Dunyasha Yetts, another former OSU wrestler. “He doesn’t deserve to be House speaker. He still has to answer for what happened to us.” Yetts recounted an incident in which he went to see Strauss for a thumb injury and the doctor tried to pull his pants down. He said he immediately told Jordan and then-head wrestling coach Russ Hellickson about the incident. They then went to confront the doctor. In the years since, Jordan has claimed he had zero knowledge of any abuse.

Another alleged victim, Rocky Ratliff, is now a lawyer representing some of the plaintiffs suing the school. He said Jordan “abandoned his former wrestlers in the Ohio State sexual abuse scandal and cover-up.”

One of the alleged victims, who thinks Jordan is politically qualified for the speaker job, would not endorse him. “My problem with Jimmy is that he has been playing with words instead of supporting us,” the anonymous man told NBC News. “None of us used the words ‘sexual abuse’ when we talked about what Doc Strauss was doing to us, we just knew it was weird and Jimmy knew about it because we talked about it all the time in the locker room, at practices, everywhere.”

Jordan didn’t respond to the allegations directly, but his spokesman Russell Dye issued this statement: “Chairman Jordan never saw or heard of any abuse, and if he had, he would have dealt with it.”

That’s a reflection of Jordan’s lack of character, said Schyck. “He put himself in this position,” he said. “If early on he jumped in on our side and validated what we were saying, what everybody knew about what Dr. Strauss was doing to us, then this wouldn’t be happening. But he decided early on, for reasons I still don’t understand, that he was going to deny knowing anything about this. Now he’s got no choice but to stick to this story that he had no idea what Dr. Strauss was doing, even though it’s a lie.”

This same lack of principles and character made Jordan one of Donald Trump’s most stalwart supporters all the way through the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Jordan was at the center of Trump’s attempted coup, advising Trump by phone that morning. He was one of the loudest proponents of Trump’s Big Lie.

It shouldn’t be a surprise that he’s sticking with his OSU lie, considering that he’s sticking with Trump’s Big Lie and using his power within the House to try to bring down Joe Biden’s presidency.

It’s a reflection of what the GOP has become that Jordan is a serious contender to be second in line to the presidency. Not that ousted Speaker Kevin McCarthy or Scalise are that much better: Both of them voted to overturn the 2020 election on the night of Jan. 6, after the Trump mob ransacked the Capitol and threatened their lives.

Liz Cheney goes at Jim Jordan for his role in Jan. 6 insurrection

House Republicans swiftly act to obstruct on Trump’s behalf

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Speaker race: Democrats united, Republicans in disarray

Posted on October 11, 2023 by Joan McCarter

House Democrats and Republicans met privately Tuesday afternoon in their respective conferences. The Democrats emerged united, in a unanimous vote that they “wrapped up in seven minutes.”

Tonight House Democrats unanimously voted to renominate Leader Hakeem Jeffries as Speaker of the House. His vision for a bipartisan governing coalition will lead us out of this Republican-manufactured chaos so we can get back to our work of putting People Over Politics.
— House Democrats (@HouseDemocrats) October 11, 2023

Then there’s the Republicans. The Tuesday meeting was a chance for the two candidates—current Majority Leader Steve Scalise and Rep. Jim Jordan—to make their case to their colleagues ahead of the voting, which will start in private sessions Wednesday. Neither candidate came out of the evening’s meeting with a clear majority or even a definite edge. Jordan has more declared supporters, but as one Republican member, North Dakota Rep. Kelly Armstrong, told an Axios reporter, it’s a secret ballot. “One, people don’t have to tell you who they’re voting for and two, they can lie to you about who they’re voting for.”

Scalise and Jordan both said that they would throw their support to whoever emerged victorious in a bid for some kind of unity, though it took Jordan some time to come right out and say it. The rank and file aren’t necessarily ready to unite, however. “I can’t say that I’ll automatically join whoever pulls out the most of them at first vote, but I might,” Rep. Dan Bishop of North Carolina told The Washington Post.

That might be what former and barely Speaker Kevin McCarthy is counting on. There’s still a core group of people who insist they will only vote for McCarthy. He’s been accused of actively undermining Scalise, according to Politico. “They are literally trying every dirty trick to fuck with Steve,” one Scalise supporter said. “It’s sad.”

McCarthy could be counting on being the only option still standing after a drawn out fight between Scalise and Jordan, but it’s hard to see any of the eight who voted to oust him last week changing their minds about him.

That includes Rep. Ken Buck of Colorado, who might not be behind anyone at this point. He had a key question for Jordan and Scalise Tuesday night: Did Donald Trump win the 2020 election?

That’s a big one for Buck, a hardcore Freedom Caucus member who is not a MAGA enthusiast, and who voted to certify the 2020 election and who has had a problem with McCarthy since Jan. 6, 2021. He confronted McCarthy in a conference meeting before the certification votes and warned him that it was wrong to choose the “politically expedient route” of sticking with Trump over “the good of the party” and upholding the Constitution.

Neither Jordan nor Scalise—who both voted against certifying President Joe Biden’s election—would give a direct answer, and “tried to have it both ways,” according to a member who spoke to Politico. Sounds like Buck might have a hard time finding a candidate in the GOP. He told the Post: “I’m not thrilled with either choice…. I think someone else will come forward, and I don’t know who that is. I’m not backing anybody, but I don’t know if it’s just these two.”

Buck might be the only Republican who is worried about things like the Constitution in this fight, but he isn’t the only one who’s having a hard time finding a candidate to get behind. “No one at this point is even remotely close to a majority,” Rep. Kat Cammack of Florida told the Post. “So I think that we’re not just going to be here for a couple extra days. My money says weeks.”

Sign if you agree: Stop the MAGA circus. Hakeem Jeffries for speaker.

GOP's speaker decision delayed as House Republicans regroup

Rep. McHenry relishes his (limited) power as speaker pro tempore

Republicans continue to fail the democracy test: Do they support Trump or the U.S. Constitution?

Posted on December 6, 2022 (Updated December 6, 2022) by Kerry Eleveld

After three consecutive dismal election cycles, Republicans still can't bring themselves to break with perennial loser Donald Trump even after his rallying cry to terminate the U.S. Constitution.

On Tuesday, the House GOP's No. 2, Rep. Steve Scalise of Louisiana, became the latest Republican to fail the democracy test: Trump or the Constitution?

Pressed by PBS Newshour reporter Lisa Desjardins on Trump's latest call to suspend "all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution," Scalise simply couldn't bring himself to condemn Trump.

"Rep. @SteveScalise told me a few minutes ago that he has not seen former Pres. Trump's words about the Constitution," tweeted Desjardins, in regard to Trump's Truth Social rant.

Desjardins proceeded to educate Scalise: "As he sees the election, from 2020, it allows for the termination of all rules and articles, including the Constitution. What do you make of that?"

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Steering clear of Trump, Scalise responded, "The Constitution is never subject to being waived or suspended. Obviously, the Constitution's our enduring document that protects our freedoms."

Desjardins followed up by asking Scalise if it's "dangerous to talk about the termination of things like that?" In other words, is it dangerous to suspend the very document that "protects our freedoms," as Scalise himself put it.

The response, according to Desjardins' tweet thread: "Scalise: *enters office, does not respond*"

So if it's Trump or the Constitution, it's still Trump for Republicans, which is the exact same message Rep. David Joyce of Ohio, who chairs the Republican Governance Group, sent Sunday on ABC's This Week.

Host George Stephanopoulos asked Joyce directly, "Can you support a candidate in 2024 who's for suspending the Constitution?"

Joyce equivocated at first, offering, "It's early, I think there's going to be a lot people in the primary."

But he ultimately admitted that he would back Trump if he won the nomination. "At the end of the day, whoever the Republicans end up picking, I think I'll fall behind."

"Even if it's Donald Trump and he's called for suspending the Constitution?" Stephanopoulos interjected.

Joyce retreated to his earlier contention that it would be a "big field" in 2024, suggesting that Trump might not win.

"That's not what I'm asking," Stephanopoulos clarified, "I'm asking you, if he's the nominee, will you support him?"

"I will support whoever the Republican nominee is," Joyce restated, adding another dash of fairy dust, "I just don't think at this point he will be able to get there."

Stephanopoulos proceeded to call Joyce's statement both "extraordinary" and "remarkable."

But the truth is, it isn't remarkable in the least from today's Republican Party—it's just more of the same from a party that has routinely capitulated to Donald Trump no matter what the circumstance. Even after Trump inspired the deadly Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. seat of government, 197 House Republicans—93% of the caucus—voted against impeaching him.

The entire Jan. 6 attack was an assault on the Constitution, the peaceful transfer of power, and the will of the people.

The brother of fallen Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick put it best on Tuesday when he explained why the Sicknick family refused to shake the hands of GOP leaders Kevin McCarthy and Mitch McConnell at a congressional gold medal ceremony for officers who defended the Capitol on Jan. 6.

"Unlike Liz Cheney, they have no idea what integrity is," Ken Sicknick said. "They can't stand up for what's right and wrong—with them, it's party first."

On Tuesday, McConnell had yet another opportunity to defend U.S. democracy when CNN’s Manu Raju asked if he would “categorically” refuse to support Trump.

"What I’m saying is, it would be pretty hard to be sworn in to the presidency if you’re not willing to uphold the Constitution,” McConnell offered.

Again, given the choice of Trump or the Constitution, McConnell demurs.

Republicans have proven over and over again their fealty to party, and personal gain supersedes their fealty to the republic. Their continued refusal to condemn a man who is calling for the "termination" of the U.S. Constitution is just a continuation of their treachery.

FLASH: Family of officer Brian Sicknick refuses to shake hands with Sen McConnell and Rep McCarthy at Congressional gold medal ceremony. Brian’s brother Ken Sicknick tells me why ====> pic.twitter.com/Y34CI8MCTi
— Scott MacFarlane (@MacFarlaneNews) December 6, 2022

Asked McConnell - in aftermath of his criticism of Trump in the past two weeks - if he could categorically say he wouldn't support him as GOP nominee. "What I’m saying is it would be pretty hard to be sworn in to the presidency if you’re not willing to uphold the Constitution" pic.twitter.com/FUdv4zIpvT
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) December 6, 2022

This is the state of the authoritarian Republican Party: willing to back an aspiring despot who *explicitly* says he wants to terminate the US Constitution, so long as he’s got an (R) by his name. We’re in trouble. pic.twitter.com/0AGd6nK0o6
— Brian Klaas (@brianklaas) December 4, 2022

Two years ago, they voted against impeachment. Now suddenly they’re deeply concerned for Ukraine

Posted on March 16, 2022 (Updated March 17, 2022) by Laura Clawson

Following Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s emotional appeal to Congress and President Joe Biden to help his country defend itself against Russia, top Republican leaders did the only thing they could think to do: use their cheering of Zelenskyy as cover to attack Biden.

Despite dressing their attacks on Biden in the language of support for Zelenskyy and Ukraine, Republicans didn’t exactly hide the real point. “The longer President Biden waits, trying to figure out excuses to not offend Putin, it's costing lives in Ukraine,” said House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, the day after Russia announced sanctions on Biden and a slate of other Democrats, but no Republicans, and just over two years after he and every other Republican, with the exception of Sen. Mitt Romney, voted against impeaching Donald Trump for withholding military aid from Ukraine to extort political favors.

When you're going straight to “excuses not to offend Putin,” you’re making it clear where your interests lie, and it’s not sincerely with the Ukrainian people.

Scalise’s fellow House Republican leader Elise Stefanik led her statement on Zelenskyy’s address with an attack on Biden’s “weakness and delay.” This is a return to form for Stefanik, who started the month with a message to Ukraine that managed not to blame Biden for Putin’s invasion, after her initial response had been aimed at Biden. Stefanik didn’t just vote against impeaching Trump: She was a key part of his impeachment defense, rising in the ranks of Republicans on the basis of that performance. For Stefanik, the inquiry into Trump having withheld military aid as part of an effort to get Ukraine to tarnish his domestic political opponent was a prime opportunity to try to tarnish Trump’s domestic political opponent—Joe Biden, the same person she is now holding responsible for Vladimir Putin’s actions.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell also went straight to Biden. McConnell had on Tuesday said Biden was guilty of “hesitancy and weakness,” and on Wednesday said, “the message to President Biden is that he needs to step up his game.” McConnell voted to acquit Trump of withholding military aid to extort Ukraine.

Republican attacks on Biden implied that the distance between their preferred policies and his were bigger than they really are. Most Republicans agree that a U.S.-imposed no-fly zone would be a bad idea. “It remains my view that putting — if that means putting U.S. troops or pilots in Ukraine, I think the answer is no,” McConnell said. He, like many other Republicans, is drawing the line for attacking Biden between the drones and other equipment Biden is sending and the airplanes McConnell claims to support. (McConnell would still find a way to attack Biden if Biden sent dozens of planes tomorrow.)

Biden is out here trying to walk the line between aiding Ukraine and avoiding World War III, and Republicans are simply looking for any excuse they can manufacture to attack him.

Republicans suddenly claim to be the biggest allies of the nation they once denounced as corrupt

Cawthorn isn't alone as a Republican crapping on Ukraine. He just has bad timing

Republicans suddenly claim to be the biggest allies of the nation they once denounced as corrupt

Posted on March 10, 2022 (Updated March 11, 2022) by Laura Clawson

It’s taken Republicans a little while to figure out their approach to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but—for now at least—they’ve settled on pretending to be the best friends Ukraine ever had. It falls apart immediately if you look at the Republican record over the past few years, but it’s what they’re going with.

Most notoriously, of course, there are these 10 words: “I would like you to do us a favor, though.” That’s what Donald Trump said as he withheld military aid in an attempt to extort Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy into manufacturing dirt on now-President Joe Biden for Trump’s personal political gain. And every single Republican other than Sen. Mitt Romney thought this was just fine. Great, really. Many actively defended Trump’s actions, which often meant trashing Ukraine. But that’s not all.

In the midst of trying to defend Trump, Rep. Jim Jordan called Ukraine “one of the three most corrupt countries on the planet.” He also condemned efforts to fight corruption in Ukraine as themselves corrupt because Biden was involved.

House Minority Whip Steve Scalise has pointed to the same ouster of a corrupt prosecutor in Ukraine as problematic because it involved then-Vice President Biden threatening to withhold aid if the prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, wasn’t fired. “If you go back to when Joe Biden was vice president, he bragged about how he withheld a billion dollars in aid to Ukraine, when Joe Biden was vice president, because he said he wanted a prosecutor to get fired, who ultimately from reports we saw was fired,” Scalise said Tuesday. The difference here is that Biden was, as a public matter of administration policy, talking about aid that would be withheld as part of an international anti-corruption effort, with the European Union and the International Monetary Fund also calling for Shokin’s firing. It’s kind of different from a secret phone call and an ask seeking personal benefit.

According to Scalise, “President Zelenskyy had called President Trump to thank him for the leadership that he provided.” In reality, it was part of Zelenskyy’s desperate efforts to get some kind of public show of support from the United States that might help ease the threat Ukraine faced from Russia, and the call came as Trump’s informal emissaries, led by Rudy Giuliani, were pressuring him to announce the very same corrupt investigation that Trump then asked for as “a favor” when Zelenskyy asked to buy Javelin missiles.

In their effort to rewrite how Trump’s first impeachment speaks to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and the Republican view of Ukraine more generally, Republicans like Scalise are returning to an old talking point. “When President Zelenskyy was asking for things like Javelin missiles that the Biden and Obama administration said no to, President Trump said yes and actually helped Ukraine get those tank-busting missiles that they needed and frankly, they’ve been using,” Scalise said. In that, he echoed Trump's February statement claiming, “it was me that got Ukraine the very effective anti-tank busters (Javelins) when the previous Administration was sending blankets.”

The Obama administration didn’t send lethal aid like Javelins in part because officials were concerned that the Ukrainian army didn’t have the capability to use them. But that changed over time—as we’re seeing, the Ukrainian military has dramatically improved since 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea. What the Obama administration did send was not blankets but UAVs, armored Humvees, counter-mortar radars, night vision devices, and more. And when Trump did send Javelins, it was only after his advisers convinced him that it would be good for U.S. defense contractors.

Now that Republicans have figured out that supporting Ukraine is their best bet, politically speaking, they are all in—to the point where you have to worry they’re going to do their best to provoke a nuclear war. Immediately after the invasion, Republicans were blaming Biden for not having stopped it. They’ve since moved on to blaming him for not doing enough to end it. “If Joe Biden won’t make him pay, the Republican Party must,” Sen. Tom Cotton said in a speech on Monday. But what does that look like when a no-fly zone would mean a world war? That’s the kind of question that needs to take precedence above making a president from the opposite party look bad. But putting anything above partisan concerns is not how Republicans operate.

‘Embarrassing,’ ‘stupid’: Republicans blast national party as if it bears no relation to them

Posted on February 8, 2022 (Updated February 9, 2022) by Kerry Eleveld

Senate Republicans have finally located their problem, and it's the Republican National Committee. After the RNC last week endorsed the Jan. 6 insurrection as "legitimate political discourse," many congressional Republicans are pretending like the national Republican Party bears no relationship to them.

"I'm not a member of the RNC," Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas said Sunday when asked whether GOP Reps. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois deserved to be censured by the RNC for participating in the Jan. 6 probe. Within the text of that censure resolution, the RNC endorsed the violent Jan. 6 assault that resulted in death and destruction as "legitimate political discourse."

"It could not have been a more inappropriate message," said Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah, the uncle of RNC chair Ronna McDaniel. Romney said he had texted with McDaniel after passage of the resolution and described her to CNN as a "wonderful person and doing her very best." But as for the resolution, Romney added, "Anything that my party does that comes across as being stupid is not going to help us."

Stupid is apt—but let's not limit the moniker to McDaniel and the national party alone. Republicans, eyeing an election cycle that should absolutely favor them based on historical trends, had the chance to bury Donald Trump last year during his second impeachment trial and leave much of his political baggage in the rearview mirror. Instead, they breathed new life into him, and now they're pretending like the RNC is solely responsible for his drag on the party.

The RNC censure resolution came at the end of a week that was kicked off by Trump dangling pardons for Jan. 6 convicts during a Texas rally the weekend before. Trump then called on Congress to investigate his former vice president, Mike Pence, for failing to unilaterally "overturn" a free and fair 2020 election.

But the RNC's endorsement of the Jan. 6 violence was just the latest in a years-long parade of Republican efforts to appease and coddle Trump. He has continually demanded absolute fealty from Republicans every step of the way, and they have acquiesced time and time again. With its censure resolution, the RNC was once again mollifying Trump by pursuing his political vendetta against Reps. Cheney and Kinzinger, both of whom voted to impeach him for inciting the Jan. 6 attack.

Rep. Tom Rice of South Carolina, also one of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump, told CNN the House GOP caucus avoided the topic of the censure altogether in its conference meeting Tuesday, suggesting the whole episode was just too cringey to touch.

“It was pretty damn embarrassing,” Rice said.

But Senate Republicans are especially prickly on the matter, particularly those who had a chance to impeach Trump for inciting the attack on the U.S. government and explicitly declined to take it.

"It's just not a constructive move, when you're trying to win elections and take on Democrats, to take on Republicans," said Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, as if no one could have imagined Trump would inspire internecine mayhem when he voted to let him off the hook for Jan. 6.

Asked if McDaniel should step aside, Thune pretended the RNC had nothing whatsoever to do with congressional Republicans. "Oh, I don't know. Ultimately, it will be up to the RNC," he said of McDaniel's fate.

Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina rolled out the same talking point Senate Republicans have been parroting every time Trump pulls them into some new controversy—2022 is all about the future for Republicans, folks.

"I think all of us up here want to talk about forward and not backward," Graham said. "We want to talk about why we should be in charge of the House and the Senate, and when you're not talking about that, that takes you in the wrong direction."

And by talking about why Republicans should be in charge, Graham means deliberately not releasing a 2022 agenda so voters will have exactly no idea what Republicans plan to do if they retake control of the upper chamber.

The frustration among most Republicans was palpable.

"I think the RNC should be focused on electing Republicans," said Sen. Roy Blunt of Missouri.

Even House Republicans, led by Trump hack Kevin McCarthy, sought to distance themselves from the RNC's unforced error.

Asked about the RNC resolution, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise told CNN, "My focus has been on what we need to do to take back the House."

The House GOP campaign chief, Rep. Tom Emmer of Minnesota, added, "We're focused on winning the majority next fall."

It wasn't exactly a full-throated stand for American democracy, but hey, Republicans want control of Congress so they can end this scurrilous investigation into the worst homegrown attack on the Capitol in U.S. history.

"We ought to capture the Jan. 6 committee and convert it to our purposes: pursuing the extent to which federal involvement might have animated violence," Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida, floating a totally unsubstantiated right-wing conspiracy theory.

To be fair, some Republicans did join the RNC in defending the insurrectionists.

"There's no doubt that there were tens of thousands of people engaged in peaceful free speech that the press and Democrats try to demonize falsely," said Sen. Ted Cruz, who voted against certification.

Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, who also voted to throw the election, called the Jan. 6 panel "illegitimate," presumably while pumping his fist.

"They're not following their own rules. And I think, frankly, it's, it harkens back to the House Committee on un-American affairs," said Hawley, engaging the "un-American" topic on which Republicans have become bonafide experts.

Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, firmly ensconced in his disreality bubble, couldn't dig out of his conspiracy rabbit hole long enough to take note of the RNC aligning itself with Jan. 6 terrorists.

"I did not pay any attention to that," said Johnson, who's up for reelection this year.

But Johnson was upstaged by House GOP Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who coughed up an entirely fictional explanation of the RNC's resolution.

“What they were talking about is the six RNC members who Jan 6th has subpoenaed, who weren't even here, who were in Florida that day," McCarthy said—something that was never even mentioned in the censure resolution.

Asked McCarthy about “legitimate political discourse.” “What they were talking about is the six RNC members who Jan 6th has subpoenaed, who weren't even here, who were in Florida that day." He says those who caused damage “should be in jail.” (RNC resolution doesn’t mention that) pic.twitter.com/k4qsLWAOv5
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) February 8, 2022

Cheney: ‘History is watching.’ House Republicans: Screw that, Trump is watching

Posted on May 6, 2021 by Laura Clawson

Rep. Liz Cheney, for now the third-ranking Republican in the House of Representatives, has decided she cares more about principles and how history will judge her than she does about the Trumpist orthodoxy of today’s Republican Party. For that, she’s about to be ousted from House Republican leadership and replaced by someone more loyal to Trump but less conservative on the issues, with a simple majority vote of the House Republicans coming as soon as next week.

Cheney refuses to participate in the lie that the election was stolen from Trump—the lie that spurred the deadly Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol—so Republicans are swiftly moving to strip her of her leadership role and replace her with Rep. Elise Stefanik, who has been all in on the Big Lie. Rep. Steve Scalise, the second-ranking House Republican, has publicly backed Stefanik over Cheney, while House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is reportedly supporting Stefanik behind the scenes after becoming increasingly critical of Cheney in public. And, on Wednesday, Donald Trump himself loudly endorsed Stefanik.

Cheney is defiant, on Wednesday evening publishing a Washington Post op-ed defending her position and calling out McCarthy for having changed his. McCarthy, she accurately charged, has “changed his story” from his Jan. 13 statement that “The president bears responsibility for Wednesday’s attack on Congress by mob rioters. He should have immediately denounced the mob when he saw what was unfolding.”

“The Republican Party is at a turning point, and Republicans must decide whether we are going to choose truth and fidelity to the Constitution,” she wrote, going on to call for Republicans to support criminal investigations of the Capitol insurrection, support a bipartisan January 6 commission with subpoena power, and “stand for genuinely conservative principles, and steer away from the dangerous and anti-democratic Trump cult of personality.”

Most Republican lawmakers, of course, will do nothing of the sort. Instead, Cheney’s House colleagues are set to vote her out next week, replacing her with Stefanik, who was elected as something of a moderate and has a much less conservative lifetime voting record than Cheney. The Club for Growth is not happy about that—though it also doesn’t seem to be defending Cheney—tweeting “Elise Stefanik is NOT a good spokesperson for the House Republican Conference. She is a liberal with a 35% CFGF lifetime rating, 4th worst in the House GOP. House Republicans should find a conservative to lead messaging and win back the House Majority.”

Back in 2017, Stefanik opposed Trump on key issues, like his withdrawal from the Paris climate accord, and voted against the tax law that was the major Republican legislative achievement of the Trump years. In late 2018, she took criticism from male Republicans for trying to help Republican women win primaries. But in 2019, she became one of Trump’s fiercest defenders during his first impeachment. It appears she had realized what would be her quickest path to leadership, and she has continued to remake herself in the Trumpy style, down to the LOTS OF CAPS in a Thursday morning tweet assailing Twitter, a private business, for “unconstitutional overreach” in having suspended her communications director.

To be clear, this is not a fight with a hero and a villain. It’s a fight between someone whose principles are largely punitive far-right ones that do include a basic respect for the democratic process and someone who apparently has no strong principles beyond her own advancement—if being a non-Trumpy Republican looks like the way to go, she’s that, and if Trump looks like the winning horse, she’s riding him. One of them is concerned that “History is watching. Our children are watching”—but is looking to create a Republican Party that is strong enough, in the long term, to hand over the maximum amount of power to the biggest corporations and promote endless war. The other is much less worried about history or policy than about getting the immediate promotion, thankyouverymuch. And today’s Republican Party is with the latter, less tied to any specific principle than to Trump—at least as long as he’s got the biggest megaphone and the most committed base—and definitely willing to jettison little things like election results or any pretense of non-racism to keep the Trump base motivated.

Morning Digest: Texas’ suburbs zoomed left in 2020, but Democrats failed to make gains in the House

Posted on January 15, 2021 by Daily Kos Elections

The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, Carolyn Fiddler, and Matt Booker, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.

Leading Off

● Pres-by-CD: Our project to calculate the 2020 presidential results for all 435 congressional districts nationwide goes to Texas, where the GOP gerrymander helped the party hold on to 23 of the state's 36 U.S. House seats despite several Republican retirements. You can find our detailed calculations here, a large-size map of the results here, and our permanent, bookmarkable link for all 435 districts here.

Donald Trump defeated Joe Biden in Texas 52-46 four years after he beat Hillary Clinton 52-43 in the Lone Star State, a shift due in part to a decline in third-party voting. Trump once again carried 22 congressional districts while the remaining 14 constituencies backed Biden, but as we've seen in so many states, these seemingly stable toplines mask considerable churn just below the surface, which we'll explore below. To help you follow along, we've put together a sheet that compares the 2016 and 2020 presidential results by district and also includes the results for the 2020 House races.

Two districts did in fact flip on the presidential level: Trump lost the 24th District in the Dallas-Fort Worth suburbs while recapturing the 23rd District along the border with Mexico. Biden, however, made major gains in a number of other suburban districts and nearly won no fewer than seven of them. Trump, meanwhile, surged in many heavily Latino areas and likewise came close to capturing three, but except for the 24th, every Trump seat is in GOP hands and every Biden seat is represented by Democrats.

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The 24th, which includes the suburbs north of Dallas and Fort Worth, is in fact a good place to start because it saw one of the largest shifts between 2016 and 2020. The district began the decade as heavily Republican turf—it backed Mitt Romney 60-38—but Trump carried it by a substantially smaller 51-44 margin four years later. Biden continued the trend and racked up a 52-46 win this time, but the area remained just red enough downballot to allow Republican Beth Van Duyne to manage a 49-47 victory in an expensive open-seat race against Democrat Candace Valenzuela.

Biden fell just short of winning seven other historically red suburban seats: the 2nd, 3rd, 6th, 10th, 21st, 22nd, and 31st, where Trump's margins ranged from just one to three points, and where the swings from 2016 ranged from seven points in the 22nd all the way to 13 points in the 3rd, the biggest shift in the state. However, as in the 24th, Biden's surge did not come with sufficient coattails, as Republicans ran well ahead of Trump in all of these seats (you can check out our guide for more information about each district).

Two seats that Democrats flipped in 2018 and stayed blue last year also saw large improvements for Biden. The 7th District in west Houston, parts of which were once represented by none other than George H.W. Bush from 1967 to 1971, had swung from 60-39 Romney to 48-47 Clinton, and Biden carried it 54-45 in 2020. Democratic Rep. Lizzie Fletcher won by a smaller 51-47 spread against Wesley Hunt, who was one of the House GOP's best fundraisers. The 32nd District in the Dallas area, likewise, had gone from 57-41 Romney to 49-47 Clinton. This time, Biden took it 54-44 as Democratic Rep. Colin Allred prevailed 52-46.

Biden's major gains in the suburbs, though, came at the same time that Trump made serious inroads in predominantly Latino areas on or near the southern border with Mexico. That rightward shift may have cost Team Blue the chance to flip the open 23rd District, which stretches from San Antonio west to the outskirts of the El Paso area.

Romney carried this seat 51-48 before Clinton took it 50-46, but Trump won it 50-48 this time. That makes the 23rd the first Romney/Clinton/Trump seat we've found anywhere in the country, and it may in fact be the only one. Amid Trump's rise here, Republican Tony Gonzales beat Democrat Gina Ortiz Jones 51-47 to succeed retiring GOP Rep. Will Hurd, who had held off Ortiz Jones only 49.2-48.7 in 2018.

Trump also fell just short in three other seats along the Rio Grande Valley. The 15th District, which includes McAllen, had supported Clinton by a 57-40 margin, but Biden prevailed only 50-49 here. Democratic Rep. Vicente González, who had won his first two general elections with ease, likewise came shockingly close to losing his bid for a third term, fending off Republican Monica De La Cruz-Hernandez, who didn't raise much money, just 51-48 in a contest that attracted minimal outside spending from either party.

The 34th Congressional District around Brownsville similarly moved from 59-38 Clinton to 52-48 Biden, though Democratic Rep. Filemón Vela ran well ahead of the top of the ticket and prevailed 55-42. Finally, the Laredo-based 28th District went from 58-38 Clinton to 52-47 Biden. Rep. Henry Cuellar, who has long been one of the most conservative Democrats in the House, won 58-39 several months after he came close to losing renomination against a progressive opponent.

Governors

● NJ-Gov: Democratic Assemblyman Jamel Holley, a notorious anti-vaxxer, last year did not rule out a primary challenge to Gov. Phil Murphy, but he's reportedly taken that option off the table and will instead run against state Sen. Joe Cryan, another fellow Democrat.

● PA-Gov: Former healthcare executive Daniel Hilferty is reportedly considering a bid for governor as a Republican, but as the Philadelphia Inquirer's Andrew Seidman notes, he'd start off with a serious liability: Hilferty served on the host committee for Joe Biden's very first fundraising event for his presidential campaign, and he went on to donate more than $85,000 to help elect him.

● TX-Gov: It's almost inevitable that, every four years, there's talk of a primary challenge to Texas' governor, and sometimes they even happen (see 2010), so why should this cycle be any different? The Dallas Morning News' Robert Garrett suggests Rep. Dan Crenshaw and former state Sen. Don Huffines as the latest possibilities, and an unnamed Crenshaw aide would only say that their boss is "not thinking about running." That places Crenshaw in the ranks of two other Republicans, both fanatical extremists, who previously did not rule out bids of their own: state party chair Allen West and Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller.

Texas, however, has an early primary and consequently an early filing deadline, typically in December. What's more, Abbott already has $38 million in his campaign account, so any would-be primary opponents will need to engage soon.

House

● LA-05: Julia Letlow, whose late husband, Luke Letlow, died last month from COVID-19 after winning an all-GOP runoff in Louisiana's 5th Congressional District, has announced that she will run in the March 20 special election for the now-vacant seat. Rep. Steve Scalise, the no. 2 House Republican and one of the most powerful GOP officials in Louisiana, also offered his endorsement.

In response, a number of fellow Republicans said they would defer to Letlow, including state Sen. Stewart Cathey, state Rep. Michael Echols, state Rep. Mike Johnson, and Ouachita Parish Police Juror Scotty Robinson. However, state Rep. Lance Harris, who lost the December runoff, hasn't commented about his plans following Letlow's decision, nor has another potential candidate, state Rep. Chris Turner.

● Votes: David Jarman takes a look at four consequential votes within the last couple weeks — the second impeachment of Donald Trump, the vote to challenge Pennsylvania’s electors, the vote to provide $2,000 stimulus checks, and the vote to override the veto of the National Defense Authorization Act — and finds that when the votes are aggregated, House Republicans are genuinely in some disarray. Their votes fall into 11 different permutations, which show some interesting fissures not just on the usual moderate-to-hard-right spectrum but also some other, harder-to-describe axes.

Mayors

● Boston, MA Mayor: City Council President Kim Janey, who would become mayor should incumbent Marty Walsh be confirmed as U.S. secretary of labor, confirmed this week that she was considering running in her own right this year. State Rep. Aaron Michlewitz meanwhile, announced Thursday that he wouldn't enter the race.

● Cincinnati, OH Mayor, OH-Sen: Hamilton County Clerk of Courts Aftab Pureval, who was the 2018 Democratic nominee for Ohio's 1st Congressional District, announced Thursday that he would run to succeed termed-out Democratic incumbent John Cranley this year. Pureval, who is of Indian and Tibetan ancestry, would be the first Asian American elected to this post.

Pureval challenged Republican Rep. Steve Chabot a little more than two years ago for a seat that includes about three-quarters of Cincinnati (the balance is in the 2nd District) and lost the very expensive campaign 51-47. Pureval decided to run for re-election last year rather than seek a rematch against Chabot, and he beat his Republican foe 57-43 as Joe Biden was carrying Hamilton County by a similar 57-41 margin. Pureval hadn't ruled out a 2022 bid against Republican Sen. Rob Portman when he was asked about it back in October, but his mayoral campaign means we can cross him out for that race.

Pureval joins a May 4 nonpartisan primary that already includes a number of fellow Democrats, and more could enter the race ahead of the Feb. 18 filing deadline. Former Mayor Mark Mallory, who served from 2005 to 2013, and City Councilman Chris Seelbach have each been gathering petitions, though neither has announced that they're in yet.

The Cincinnati Business Courier's Chris Wetterich also reports that two other Democrats, Hamilton County Commissioner Denise Driehaus and former County Commissioner David Pepper, who also recently stepped down as state party chair, are also considering.

● Fort Worth, TX Mayor: Nonprofit head Mattie Parker, who served as chief of staff for the mayor and council under retiring GOP incumbent Betsy Price, said this week that she was considering a bid for mayor.

● New York City, NY Mayor: Businessman Andrew Yang, who waged an unsuccessful bid for the 2020 Democratic presidential nominee, announced Wednesday that he would run for mayor. Yang would be the city's first Asian American mayor.

Yang, who launched his campaign by pledging to implement the universal basic income plan locally that he championed during his White House bid, entered the contest with the backing of freshman Rep. Ritchie Torres, who represents a seat located in the Bronx. Yang joins a number of other candidates in the June 22 Democratic primary, which will be conducted using instant-runoff voting.

Yang has lived in New York City since 1996, but he's had little involvement in city politics until now: Indeed, City & State reported last month that he had not even voted in any of the last four mayoral elections.

Yang also attracted some bad press this week when he explained that he'd temporarily relocated to upstate New York last year as the pandemic worsened by saying, "We live in a two-bedroom apartment in Manhattan. And so, like, can you imagine trying to have two kids on virtual school in a two-bedroom apartment, and then trying to do work yourself?" That remark quickly drew plenty of scorn from his rivals, who didn't hesitate to portray him as out-of-touch with regular New Yorkers.

Grab Bag

● Where Are They Now: Former Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder was charged on Thursday with two misdemeanor counts of "willful neglect of duty" stemming from his role in the Flint water crisis, and eight other state and local officials were also indicted Thursday by Attorney General Dana Nessel. Snyder, who pleaded not guilty, could be punished with up to a year in prison on each charge.