House GOP Throws 2 Crooks And A Nazi Overboard

Recently, J.D. Scholten, who's still considering another run against Steven King in northwest Iowa, told me that "In the last decade, King has missed 82% of the Small Business Committee hearings and nearly 40% of the Agriculture Committee hearings. He continues to abdicate leadership for his own personal agenda as the 4th district continues to fall behind." Now he misses 100% of the meetings on those two key committees, since the Republican leadership kicked him off both and many Republicans are hoping one of the 3 Republicans challenging King in a 2020 primary beats him. McCarthy is well aware that without a seat on the House Agriculture Committee, King is even more useless to his constituents than he usually is. (And he usually is.)

But King isn't the only Republican who finds himself in this predicament. Tuesday Splinter published a really funny piece of reporting by Samantha Grasso, The GOP's Lonely Heartless Club. She wrote that "Duncan Hunter of California, Chris Collins of New York, and Steve King of Iowa have a whole lot of time to do nothing in the House of Representatives, where nobody wants to sit next to them during lunch or play tag with them at recess. The three Republicans were basically excommunicated from the House GOP when they were pulled off their committee assignments, forcing them to watch the 116th Congress from the sidelines."

Hunter, the vaping congressman, and Collins were both stripped of their committee assignments last summer after being federally charged with misusing campaign funds for personal use with his wife and insider trading, respectively. Both pleaded not guilty, ran for reelection in their districts, and (somehow??) still won. However, under a new House GOP conference rule adopted shortly after the elections, any representative under indictment for a felony must be removed from committees and leadership posts “until the legal matter gets resolved,” according to Politico.

Ammar Campa-Najjar nearly beat Hunter last year and is running against him again. Today he asked, "Can someone please tell me why taxpayers have to continue paying Duncan Hunter’s salary? Given that Hunter is now simply watching from the sidelines and unable to perform the basic duties of his job as a Congressman, he should do the right thing and immediately return his entire salary to the taxpayers or donate it to a local charity. It’s one thing to put taxpayers through the embarrassment of watching their Congressman get indicted on 60 charges, but to also make them pay your salary while you sit around and await your criminal trial-- now that’s just adding insult to injury."

Meanwhile, King is spending his time kicking rocks over by the edge of the playground as punishment for defending white nationalism and white supremacy in an interview with the New York Times last month.

Without their committees, Hunter, Collins, and King have been left to twiddle their thumbs or desperately vie for some C-SPAN time with short House floor speeches at odd hours of the day. And while they might have some luck with congressional caucuses, that venue is all but pointless without the help of other representatives. From Politico:

The members could also put more energy into congressional caucuses or lobby their colleagues to move their bills, though there is little guarantee for success. It’s much more difficult for a single lawmaker to wield influence in the House, whereas in the Senate, any lone member can hold up floor proceedings...

Yet caucuses are hardly a substitute for congressional committees, where lawmakers hone their policymaking skills and climb the party ranks... That means the castaways would likely need the cooperation of their colleagues to be effective-- and there is little appetite, especially among Democrats, to work closely with the trio of lawmakers who are under indictment or condemned for racist remarks...

“Zero” is how Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH) described the level of interest among his colleagues in working with Collins, Hunter or King.

Hunter and King, clearly upset that no one wants to come over to their houses after school for Xbox and Totino’s Pizza Rolls, did not return Politico’s requests for comment. But Collins told the site he plans on using his newfound free time to focus on constituent services, attend more district events, get underutilized congressional caucuses running again, and possibly co-sponsoring bills that lost their GOP backers in the midterms.

“I’m disappointed, but I’m making the best of it,” Collins told Politico.

Inspiring!

It's widely believed that the House GOP leadership is encouraging local Republicans to primary Collins so that progressive Democrat Nate McMurray doesn't take the R+11 seat away from them, something he nearly did-- by a fraction of 1%-- in 2018. I spoke to Nate today-- who is almost definitely running for the NY-27 seat again-- and he told me "The people of our region were lied to. They were told their vote was essential, that a vote for the party was more important than a vote for integrity. We can never trust these men or the people who helped them stay in office."