Have you noticed the rush of House Republicans calling it quits in the last few weeks?
Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.) announced his exit Nov. 1. He explained that to be a member of the Republican House majority means putting up with the “many Republican leaders [who] are lying to America, claiming that the 2020 election was stolen.”
Buck is predicting that even more House Republicans will leave “in the near future.”
The day before Buck said good-bye, House Appropriations Chair Kay Granger (R-Texas) also quit. Granger had been a leader among House Republicans who prevented the far-right, election-denying Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) from becoming Speaker of the House.
Also in October, Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-Ariz.) said she was quitting. “Right now, Washington, D.C. is broken,” she said. “It is hard to get anything done.”
In late September, Rep. Victoria Spartz (R-Ind.) took the exit game to a new level of drama by threatening to leave immediately instead of waiting on a previously announced retirement. “The Republican House is failing the American people again,” she said in February, explaining that the House is now “like a theater full of actors in the circus.” She summed up her distaste by saying “our children will be ashamed of another worthless Congress.”
This rush of Republicans abandoning the House is tied to former president Trump’s large lead in the GOP presidential primary race.
Every Republican still in the House next year will be forced to run for reelection while possibly supporting a convicted felon at the head the GOP ticket. They will also have to say they believe the lie that the 2020 election was stolen.
The scary depth of this trap awaiting House Republicans next year was evident in the bloody fight that led them to shut down the House for three weeks before they could agree on a replacement for ousted Speaker Kevin McCarthy.
Despite the majority of the caucus expressing disgust with the extremist Republicans who pushed out McCarthy, they replaced McCarthy with another election-denier, Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.).
Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) recently described the House Republican caucus as wanting former President Trump as speaker. In Johnson, she said, “they got their man.”
In fact, Trump sent signals that he did not want a more pragmatic conservative, Rep. Tom Emmer (R-Minn.), to become Speaker for one reason: Emmer had said that President Biden defeated Trump in a fair election.
Trump’s hypnotic hold on Republicans in the House was evident when Rep. Steve Scalise (R- La.) was recently asked if Trump lost the 2020 election.
“Can you say unequivocally the 2020 election was not stolen,” asked ABC’s George Stephanopoulos. Scalise refused to answer even when Stephanopoulos cited several court rulings that confirmed there is no evidence of widespread vote fraud.
“Thanks for your time,” Stephanopoulos finally said, abruptly bringing the fruitless interview to an end. It was reflective of the dead-end mindset that now defines the GOP-led House.
The bad behavior continued last week with House Republicans authorizing subpoenas for Biden’s family in an effort to impeach the president.
“It was the most significant move in the impeachment inquiry…despite no evidence that the president had committed high crimes or misdemeanors,” reported The New York Times.
Republicans in the House now indicate their only priority is to distract public attention from the four indictments and 91 criminal charges against Trump.
They are locked into fear of Trump attacking them even though last Tuesday’s election results signaled that voters reject extreme right-wing MAGA Republicanism.
A Trump-backed Republican lost the race for governor in Republican dominated Kentucky while Democrats increased their control of the Virginia state legislature.
“Daniel Cameron [in Kentucky’s governor’s race] is the millionth Republican candidate to lose because he was endorsed by Trump,” said conservative commentator Ann Coulter.
The Washington Post reported last week on an effort by Trump allies to punish anyone who refuses to go along with his false claims of a stolen election.
“There is no question in my mind he is going to go after people that have turned on him,” former Trump chief of staff John Kelly said. “The lesson the former president learned from his first term is don’t put guys like me … in those jobs. The lesson he learned was to find sycophants.”
Former Rep. David Jolly (R-Fla.) left the party of Trump in 2018. He now warns that Trump intends to use any return to the White House to fulfill a “scorched earth” and “white nationalist throwback agenda,” Jolly stated on MSNBC.
To repeat, that means any Republican on the ballot in 2024 faces the ugly prospect of being asked to defend Trump for the next three years, while getting nothing done on Capitol Hill.
And they will be asked to make that sacrifice while facing the reality that Trump’s popularity with the far-right does not translate into votes down the ballot other Republican candidates.
As singer Kenny Rogers sang years ago “you got to know when to walk away — and know when to run.”
More and more House Republicans are saying it is time to walk away.
Juan Williams is an author and a political analyst for Fox News Channel.