Daily Archives: January 5, 2022

Republicans in the Missouri House are set to enter the 2022 legislative session without the veto-proof majority they have wielded for nearly a decade.

Through resignations, death and appointments to other state jobs, the GOP caucus will have 108 members, which is not enough votes to override a veto by the governor or approve a special emergency clause in legislation that makes laws go into effect immediately after theyve been signed.

The loss of members could be alleviated if Gov. Mike Parson were to schedule special elections in those particular districts, but the governor has not signaled he plans to order any.

At this time, the Governors Office has not gotten a request for a special election, spokesperson Kelli Jones said following a meeting of Parsons staff Monday.

The Missouri House has 163 districts. Of those, 114 had been represented by Republicans and 49 were represented by Democrats. Republicans have held their super-majority status since 2012, using their grip on power to loosen gun laws, tighten restrictions on abortion and cut taxes.

But in order to override a veto or pass an emergency clause, 109 votes are needed.

Officially, there are four House vacancies following the resignations of Republicans Rick Roeber of Lees Summit, Becky Ruth of Festus and Wayne Wallingford of Cape Girardeau, and the October death of Rep. Tom Hannegan, R-St. Charles.

Rep. Justin Hill stoked controversy last year for attending the Jan. 6 rally at the U.S. Capitol instead of his own swearing-in ceremony.

In addition, Reps. Aaron Griesheimer of Washington and Justin Hill of Lake Saint Louis are expected to turn in their resignations as early as this week after they took new private sector jobs.

Hill, who has been a lightning rod in the chamber after he skipped his swearing in last year to attend the Jan. 6 rally in Washington, D.C., that led to the storming of the U.S. Capitol by loyalists to former President Donald Trump, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

The implications of the six-member decrease in GOP headcount may surface later this month when lawmakers will be asked to approve new congressional maps as part of the once-per-decade redistricting process.

If the GOP cant muster the votes for an emergency clause for the maps to go into effect immediately and Democrats dont provide any yes votes, the new map wouldnt become effective until Aug. 28, which is the normal time for new laws to go into effect.

Under that timeline, the Aug. 2 primary would be in question because candidates cannot run in districts that dont exist.

Governors in Missouri have the power to schedule special elections, but Parson has been largely silent on the issue over the past year.

And even if he does schedule one, the winner of such a race might not be seated in the House until April, which is less than a month before the scheduled end of the legislative session on May 13.

Rep. Dan Shaul, R-Imperial, the point person on the congressional map-making process, acknowledged the number of Republicans will likely affect the passage of the maps.

The math will tell you that if we want to pass the map, we will need Democratic votes, Shaul said. I believe we will get bipartisan support.

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On eve of 2022 session, resignations, death taking toll on Republican majority - Columbia Missourian

In a growing number of 2022 Republican primaries, former President Donald Trump has stepped in to endorse a candidate other than the incumbent, putting him at odds with some in the party establishment. Its one of several story lines creating a showdown that could help shape the the outcome of the midterms and the future direction of the party.

Trump has so far endorsed nine candidates challenging incumbents, including a Senate candidate in Alaska, a gubernatorial candidate in Idaho and a House candidate in Wyoming.

Trumps endorsements put him on a collision course with his former Vice President Mike Pence, who told incumbent Republican governors in November he would support them, as well as the Senate Leadership Fund, a super PAC aligned with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, which will back Senate incumbents and intervene in cases where a candidate is a clear threat to lose a seat in a general election, the group told Axios. In other races, Trump will face off with other conservative kingmakers, like Arizonas gubernatorial race, where he and former vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin endorsed competing candidates.

The suburbs could determine which side prevails, said Wendy Schiller, a political science professor at Brown University.

I think there is a big divide between elite GOP members and their core Trump-supporting rank-and file voters, but the key group that will decide the 2022 elections are the suburban GOP voters who are conservative but also want less uncertainty and chaos in their government, Schiller wrote in an email. The problem for the GOP is that these Trump endorsements will push candidates so far to the right that suburban GOP voters and independents could be repelled by them.

In Virginia, a commonwealth Biden won just one year before, Republican gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin showed his party a path to victory after keeping Trump at a distance. Youngkin placated the Trump wing early in the campaign before tacking more to the center for the general election and winning the race.

Trump-endorsed candidates, however, dont seem likely to follow that playbook. Despite no evidence of widespread fraud in 2020 an Associated Press review of every potential case of voter fraud in six states Trump has challenged found just 475 disputed ballots out of 25.5 million ballots cast, a number too small to change the results Trump-endorsed candidates like Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake said she would not have certified the election, while Idaho gubernatorial candidate Janice McGeachin has called for a 50-state audit.

As the party out of power, Republicans are likely to take back Congress, and Bidens falling approval rating plus redistricting add to their advantage. Relitigating the 2020 election, though, could threaten Republicans chances in tightly contested states, like Arizona or Georgia.

In a state like Georgia, where Stacy Abrams and (Sen. Raphael) Warnock will mobilize the base of the Democratic Party, any drop-off in suburban GOP voters will cost them both the governors race and the Senate race, even in the face of voter suppression laws, Schiller said.

Republican strategist Karl Rove believes Trumps endorsements, based on how vocally a candidate is willing to support his claim that the 2020 election was stolen through widespread fraud, and not so much on a candidates viability, could be a recipe for disaster.

This leaves Mr. Trump backing candidates who will likely falter in the general election, Rove wrote in a recent Wall Street Journal editorial.

In his business career, Mr. Trump put his name on everything from steaks to menswear to vodka, with mixed results, Rove wrote. Now he risks more than diluting his personal brand. Mr. Trump could help some Democrats hang on in an otherwise devastating election cycle in 2022 by forcing their opponents to harangue voters about an unpopular topic. If the GOP cant learn to shake the Trump obsession with alleged election fraud, the former president could even hand Democrats the White House again.

Endorsing nonincumbents is risky, since theyre less likely to win, but should Trumps picks prevail at the ballot box, it would further cement his hold over the party.

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Who is Trump endorsing in the 2022 mid-term elections? - Deseret News

All Mary Miller has to show for her time in Congress is quoting Hitler and voting with Democrats like AOC and the far-left squad to defund our military and block a pay raise for our troops. Thats shameful, DeGroot said. Its clear that Mary Miller is all talk, no action.

Just days after being sworn into office, Miller positivelyquoted Adolf Hitlerin apreparedspeech outside of the U.S. Capitol, saying Hitler was right on one thing.

On Jan. 5, 2021, two days into her House term, Miller issued a speech to the conservative group Moms for America.She quotedAdolf Hitler, saying: Each generation has the responsibility to teach and train the next generation. You know, if we win a few elections, were still going to be losing unless we win the hearts and minds of our children. This is the battle. Hitler was right on one thing: he said, Whoever has the youth has the future.

Rodney Davis is a conservative who gets things done, DeGroot said. Hes already been hard at work highlighting his conservative accomplishments and work with President Trump during his time in office. Thats why hes earned support from countless grassroots Republican leaders in the district. Our campaign looks forward to educating voters on how Rodney is an effective conservative member of Congress and Mary is not.

Do members of Congress have to live in their district?

Mary Miller lives in the 12thCongressional District, not the 15thDistrict, though House members are not required to reside in the district they represent. Anyone can run for Congress as long as they are at least 25 years old, have been a U.S. citizen at least seven years and live in the state they will represent.

Miller has endorsed Darren Bailey for Illinois Governor, who has selected Never Trumper Stephanie Trussell as his running mate, and voted Noon the FY22 defense budget, referred to as the NDAA, the Davis campaign noted. The NDAA funds the military and provides a pay raise for the troops. Alsovoting nowere Democrat Reps. Alexandra Ocasio Cortez and other members of the far left Democrat Squad.

DeGroot described Davis as pro-life, pro-Second Amendment, and is a leading voice against Nancy Pelosis partisan 1/6 Select Committee and Congressional Democrats attempts to push a federal takeover of our election system.

Davis, 51, has beenendorsedby 32 of the 35 Republican county chairmen in the 15thDistrict, Congressmen Darin LaHood and Mike Bost, former Congressman John Shimkus, and over a dozen state lawmakers who represent the 15thDistrict in the Illinois General Assembly.

In 2020, Davis served as an Illinois Co-Chair of President Donald Trumps re-election campaign. He opposed both attempts by Democrats in Congress to impeach President Trump and voted with Trumpnearly 90%of the time when he was in office.

This past Aug. 27, following withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, Miller called for the impeachment of President Biden.

President Joe Biden has shown a reckless disregard for the safety and security of our troops stationed overseas and Americans here at home, she said then. Congress must act and begin immediate impeachment hearings to hold the President responsible for the decisions he made that cost service members their lives.

Prior to being elected to the U.S. House in 2012, Davis served as Projects Director for Congressman John Shimkus (who had represented the old 15thDistrict) for 16 years. Miller, 62, won the 2020 election with 70% of the vote, becoming the first Republican woman elected to represent Illinois in Congress sinceJudy Biggertleft office in 2013.

Her bio notes she is a wife, mother, grandmother (seven kids and 17 grandchildren), and local farmer who serves as a voice for families and farmers ignored by D.C. insiders in the swamp. On the House Agriculture Committee, Miller worked with both parties to pass rural broadband legislation, fund vital crop insurance programs, and allow milk back into the school lunch program. She has also introduced legislation to stop the Biden EPA from infringing on farmers and ranchers with burdensome Waters of the United States (WOTUS) regulations, her bio says.

The 2022 primary will be held June 28.

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The mud is already flying in bitter battle to be Republican candidate in the Illinois 15th Congressional District - WHBF - OurQuadCities.com

What does it mean to be a Republican in the year 2022? Being hated. Yes, by the leftbut more importantly, also by members of your own party.

Here in the bad, red place, hardly anyone gets along. Especially after January 6th. Why? Consider this a simple question: Whom does Donald Trump actually like?

In the old days, all a Republican had to do to make Trump happy was kiss his ass with some cheap flattery. Say hes the biggest, strongest, handsomest, smartest, richest dude in history and that would be enough. But today, being on Trumps good side requires accepting his 2020 election lie and endorsing his various schemes to overturn the results.

And if youre not gonna do that? Then GTFO. Trump doesnt want you around. As long as Trump is in charge, your future in the GOP is dead.

Just ask Mike Pence.

Pence spent four years as vice president gazing adoringly into Trumps profile and swooning over his broad shoulders only to be cast out when he refused to block Joe Bidens certification as president. Trump told Pence, I dont want to be your friend anymore if you dont do this. When Pence didnt, he was promptly sentenced to death, political and otherwise, by Trumps troops who chanted Hang Mike Pence as they marauded the halls of Congress. Trump told ABCs Jonathan Karl that his supporters wanted to hang Mike Pence because its common sense, Jon. Trump recently described Pence as mortally wounded.

Podcast January 04 2022

What's sustaining the belief that the election was stolen from Trump? It's rage-makers like Dan Bongino, who feed existe...

Likewise, after Attorney General William Barr told a reporter there was no widespread fraud in the 2020 election, Trump fumed at him: You must really hate Trump. Similarly, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger lost any goodwill they might have felt from the former president when they informed him they could not find enough votes for him to win that state. Ditto Arizona Governor Doug Ducey.

Heck, the number of Trumps own cabinet officials whom the former president cant standand who cant stand him in returnis remarkable.

Because heres the rub: To the former president, being Trumps friend means never saying no to him. Even when it comes to acting on lies that caused an insurrection.

Its the friendship of the mob boss: Do what he tells you and there wont be any trouble. Which explains a lot of the behind-the-scenes grumbling in Republican politics. The guys paying protection money never actually like the mob boss.

Then there is the handful of Republicans who decided to openly buck Trump.

Ten Republicans in the House and seven Republicans in the Senate voted to impeach Trump for inciting the January 6th insurrection. Mitt Romney was among them. Generally known as a mild-mannered Mormon, he reportedly yelled, You have caused this! at the Electoral College-objecting Josh Hawley as Trumps mob breached the Capitol.

Another objector, Jim Jordan, attempted to escort Liz Cheney away from danger during that time. She slapped his hand away, telling him, Get away from me. You fucking did this.

Today its the Romneys and the Cheneys who are getting yelled at.

Theyre harangued by the hard-core Trumpists and lukewarm anti-anti Trumpists who want to pretend that January 6th never happened. The two wings align to make the lives of pro-impeachment Republicans as miserable as possible through ridicule, seizure of positions, censure, and primaries.

And its working. Cheney and Adam Kinzinger now stand pretty much alone when it comes to taking concrete action to hold anyone from Trump World accountable for the attack.

Republican leadershipwho are functionally MAGA sheeple with taxpayer-funded Washington office suiteshave stood aside, unwilling or incapable of holding Trump accountable. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy initially stated that Trump had responsibility for the mob attack, but then declined to make him face any consequences.

Both still support him as party leader and both have said that they will back him as the 2024 Republican presidential nominee, and in the midterms, will support his endorsed candidates.

If McConnell and McCarthy hate anyone more than Trump, it might be themselves for licking the boots of the man they know was responsible for an attack on their own house.

Even in Super-Duper Trump World, things are tense. In the media, people like Alex Jones are on permanent offense to push Newsmax, which pushes OANN, which pushes radio hosts and assorted conservative media websites, which push Fox News further and further out onto the fringe.

Because of the gravitational pull of these internet loons, Republicans in Congress have to answer to trolls-turned-member of Congress such as Marjorie Taylor Greene, who relishes her role as Trumps elected enforcer.

Although Greene regularly harasses people of all political stripes, her Twitter beef with fellow Republican Nancy Mace stands out. Greene went after Mace because Mace criticized another troll-turned-member, Lauren Boebert, for her bigoted remarks about a colleague.

Former Navy SEAL Dan Crenshaw, a self-styled live-action dynamo of the Trump era, attempted to push back against the Greene gang. Upset over being unfairly targeted with a vote to fund vaccine systems, he issued a warning that Trump-aligned grifters were lying to voters about the existence of a vaccine database to track and punish the unvaccinated. Crenshaw said people needed to see the difference between performance artists and legislators and mentioned that Kinzinger, considered a traitor for his work on the January 6th committee, had voted with Trump 99 percent of the time.

For this, Crenshaw was put on blast by right-wing radio talkers who declared him a false prophet and said they were embarrassed to have helped him win his seat.

These fights were, on the surface, about vaccine politics and speech, but the reason someone like Greene gets away with it, and someone like Cheney gets booted by leadership, goes back to January 6th: Greene insists Trump is the one true president and that the rioters are political prisoners. Cheney doesnt. Mace and Crenshaw waver. They stepped out of line.

And thats what this is really all about.

It goes like this: Trumps election deniers hate anyone who doesnt go along completely with the lie. Meanwhile, the people who believe that Trump is responsible for January 6th and hate what he didas well as the people who cant bring themselves to take a firm positionboth hate the situation theyre in.

For now, the election deniers are in charge because its impossible to be a Republican in good standing (with Trump) unless you attest to the lie and approve of its subsequent actions: sham audits, smears against election workers and voting machine companies, and new laws designed to make overturning the 2024 election possible.

The Trump wing isnt interested in building a big-tent party; it wants to maintain and expand the political army that showed up for him on January 6th. And not just the randos in camo and sweatpants, but the famous people in Congress and the media, too. Those are the kind of Republicans Trump wants to elevate.

Think yes to Patriot Purge with Tucker Carlson. No to Sunday soup with Chris Wallace. Think about the Minnesota Republican gubernatorial field where, in a recent debate, not a single candidate would say that Joe Biden won the 2020 election. Think about the Senate candidates endorsed by Trump with a record of violence and a willingness to do Trumps bidding.

What a telling combination.

As always, thats the message of the mob boss. Do what he wants and youll be left alone. But say no? Thats when you get violence. Happy now?

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What It Means to Be a Republican in 2022 - The Bulwark

Representative Madison Cawthorn, the bombastic North Carolina Republican, doesnt care that the states conservative establishment is uniting against him. As the youngest member of Congress, at twenty-six, and one of the most headline-grabbing, Cawthorn contends that weak Republican leaders are responsible for leaving the United States nearly thirty trillion dollars in debt. He told me, Thats thanks to people who have been kind of ignorant and slow, not realizing that the Democratic Party is filled with socialists who are so organized, so vicious, and so strong that we have got to start fighting back.

It might come as a surprise that increasingly radical Republicanswho control twenty-six governorships and a Supreme Court majority, and are favored to take back both the Senate and the Houseare not putting up a fight against Democrats, or that the national debt is the legacy of Democrats alone. But that is Cawthorns story, and he is harnessing it to challenge entrenched Republican authority in North Carolina and around the country. After a leader of the conservative John Locke Foundation called him a callow and appallingly ignorant young man who regularly embarrasses conservatives and Republicans, whether they admit it or not, Cawthorn was unmoved. He told me, If I have to call somebody out, and call the Republican Party of old spineless and capitulatory, then Im more than happy to do that. Youve destroyed my country.

An enthusiastic promoter of a second Donald Trump Presidency, with his own sights set on becoming governor, Cawthorn said that he aims to help set the agenda for the moment when Republicans return to power in Congressand to wrench the Party further to the right. He has the backing of Trump, and he is building alliances with the likes of Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert, and insurgents in North Carolina. Last month, he poked another stick at North Carolinas Republican establishment when he darted into a freshly drawn congressional district, widely believed to have been carved out for the states influential House speaker, Tim Moore. Rather than face Cawthorn, who has raised more than two million dollars this campaign cycle, Moore announced that he would be running for relection instead.

Three weeks later, Cawthorn visited Trump at Mar-a-Lago, where he shared a list of endorsements called Congressman Cawthorns Plan for North Carolina. When I asked him about the list, which included incumbents and unorthodox contenders for Democratic and open seats, he said that they are great America First candidates. The Republican targets of his rhetoric, he told me, are the ones whove got the pleated pants and the tassel loafers, and they just want to see their name in the paper every other week. And thats exactly what seventy per cent of Congress people are.

Cawthorns rise has been swift. Raised in Hendersonville, North Carolina, where he was homeschooled by his family, he was involved in a severe car crash when he was eighteen, which left him reliant on a wheelchair. He enrolled in Patrick Henry College, but dropped out after one semester. In early 2020, he was just twenty-four, not yet old enough to take a seat in Congress but unafraid to challenge older and more experienced candidates. He worked his way through a crowded field, competing for the Eleventh District seat vacated by Mark Meadows, a Freedom Caucus founder who resigned to become Trumps chief of staff. Cawthorn finished in second place in the primary, beating a seasoned state senator by barely a thousand votes and earning a spot in a June runoff against Lynda Bennett, a Meadows family friend who trumpeted her endorsement by Trump and otherwise kept a low profile.

A few days before the runoff, I drove to Cawthorns final rally, held in a showroom connected to a gun store in his home town of Hendersonville. There, over a barbecue dinner, he shared his vision of a country facing multiplying threats. He criticized the mainstream media and the far-left lefties, who, he said, were trying to sow discord. He worried that the children he hopes to have one day will grow up in a country with an eighty-per-cent tax rate, so they can give free stuff to all kinds of people all over the world. He lamented an American welfare system that is basically incentivizing young women, especially minority women, to not get married, and have more children, because they get more welfare checks because of that. In the runoff, he trounced Bennett, and he went on to a comfortable win over Moe Davis, an Asheville-based Democrat, in the November election. His first tweet on the night of his victory: Cry more, lib.

Cawthorn made news days after being sworn in by speaking at Trumps January 6th Stop the Steal rally, where Cawthorn spread unfounded allegations of election fraud and called Republican colleagues cowards. He later falsely blamed the days violence not on Trump supporters but on agitators from the left. In August, he called the Trump supporters who targeted police officers and invaded the Capitol political prisoners. Recently, Cawthorn accused Joe Biden of intentionally trying to destroy this country. I asked whether he really believes that. He answered that the President is a tyrant, but also senile. Perhaps I did misspeak, he said. I dont believe that Joe Biden is actually in command of anything. I mean, we all see his cognitive decline on full display. He added, as if to settle the question, At the end of the day, its the Joe Biden regime, so whoevers behind the curtain.

Cawthorn is a skilled dispenser of acid comments, but his longer statements can be harder to follow, as he roams through disconnected talking points. I asked him to name a few conservative values. He started by saying the ability to be a free thinker. Another is not being addicted to the serotonin high that you get when youre outraged and letting those cooler heads prevail. He then spoke of honoring the nuclear family and taking care of every American. Young men and women, he said, need to be surrounded with beauty and things that inspire them to be the greatest they can possibly be, instead of saying, Hey, youre so mitigated and youre so attacked. And the patriarchy is destroying you. And its because of white supremacy. And its because, well, you know, Asians always score higher, so we need to make it more difficult for them to be able to get into college, with affirmative action. Thats just all bullshit. I mean, Im telling you, if you turn off your news and you turn off your social media for a few days, and you go outside, youll look around and, hey, everythings actually pretty O.K. Thats inherently a conservative value.

So far, Cawthorns pontification has outshone his legislative activity. He has said, in fact, that he built his congressional staff for communications, not legislation. Beyond several efforts to improve benefits and opportunities for military veterans, he introduced a small-bore measure, grounded in the free market, to expand rural broadband, but he voted against the Democratic-led infrastructure bill that includes sixty-five billion dollars for broadband. He asked his staff to send me a sheet labelled Congressman Cawthorn Legislative Accomplishments. The list includes a proposal to block enforcement of federal vaccine mandates and a bill to prevent the U.S. Department of Education from spending taxpayer dollars to fund its radical, anti-American critical-race-theory priorities.

I had noticed how much more assertive Cawthorn has become since taking officeand how much more vitriolic, telling a Faith and Freedom Coalition event, for example, about looking Nancy Pelosi in her eye, every single day at work, and seeing how much she hates this nation. But I hadnt seen him in person since last years Hendersonville rally. And so, in October, I made my way to Cullowhee, where he was giving a speech to the Turning Point USA chapter at Western Carolina University. Cawthorn sat in his wheelchair near a tall sign that read Big Government Sucks, and railed against Pelosi, Biden, and critical race theory. He mimicked Kamala Harriss laugh and said that journalists are literally coming just shy of spitting on me in the halls of Congress. I look around and I see, O.K., youre socialists and you work for a fake-news company thats trying to profiteer off creating division and hatred. As dozens of young people lined up to take selfies with Cawthorn, Tristin Goode, an eighteen-year-old student, said that he was thrilled by the performance. He and his friends find many politicians dull, but he admires how Cawthorn really brings out the passion in people, really ignites people.

Despite Cawthorns national profile and connections to Trump, some prominent North Carolina Republicans are trying to defeat him this fall, based on concerns about his character and his role in the uprising on January 6th. In last years Republican primary, Cawthorn owed a significant debt to George H. Erwin, Jr., a retired Hendersonville sheriff who commended him to sheriffs and politicians scattered across the districts seventeen counties. Erwin considered him an amazing young man, eloquent on the stump and inspiring. Then came January 6th. When I saw his speech to the crowd in Washington, I thought this is not good. I saw no calming words and people died and were injured, Erwin wrote on Facebook, offering an apology for having misled law officers, politicians, friends, and family. Man, I spent forty years in law enforcement. I shouldve known better, he told me. This hate and vitriol, thats not me. Last year, three political newcomers announced that they would challenge Cawthorn in the Republican primary. He cant buy maturity, experience, and knowledge, Rod Honeycutt, a retired Army colonel and one of the three candidates, told me when we met in Asheville. He spoke of his own military leadership, his international-affairs experience, and his church connections, and pledged to pay closer attention to voters in the district. On policy issues, Honeycutt believes that they are closely aligned, but he does not pretend that Trump won the election. Other challenges have emerged from Wendy Nevarez, a Navy veteran, and Bruce OConnell, a businessman, plus a raft of Democrats, one of whom, Jasmine Beach-Ferrara, has raised nearly a million dollars in a district that leans Republican.

Cawthorns opponents have been aided by questions about his personal history that emerged during the 2020 campaign. Two assertions, central to his political profile and later shown to be false, are connected to the car crash that left him partially paralyzed. He was asleep in the passenger seat of a BMW X3, his feet on the dashboard, when the driver, Bradley Ledford, dozed off. The car sped off the road and smashed into a concrete barrier. Cawthorn told fellow-students at Patrick Henry that Ledford had left him to die in a fiery tomb. He runs to safety deep in the woods and just leaves me in a burning car as the flames start to lick my legs. But Cawthorns father and Ledford himself have said that it was Ledford who pulled Cawthorn from the wreckage. When questioned during a deposition related to the accident, Cawthorn admitted that he had no recollection of the crash or its immediate aftermath. Cawthorn has also claimed that the crash spoiled his plans to enroll at the Naval Academy. But in the deposition, taken more than two years before he began his campaign, he acknowledged that he had been rejected by the Naval Academy before the crash.

As Cawthorn runs for relection, one opposition group, run by Democrats, is pushing local authorities to file charges against him for trying to carry a gun onto a commercial flight at Ashevilles airport, and for repeatedly carrying a hunting knife onto school and educational property, in defiance of state law. Another group, the conservative Sentinel PAC, is striking closer to Cawthorns image as a churchgoing, homeschooled Christian. Multiple women have delivered credible allegations that Cawthorn forcibly kissed or touched them, which the congressman denies. In the fall of 2020, more than a hundred and seventy alumni of Patrick Henry College, which markets itself as having an Unwavering Biblical Worldview, signed an open letter that called him a wolf in sheeps clothing who made our small, close-knit community his personal playground of debauchery. The alumni accused Cawthorn of sexually predatory behavior and said that he misrepresented his past. We should have better people than Madison, people who are honest, people who arent sexual predators, people who are who they say they are, Rachael Warf, a Sentinel PAC spokesperson, told me.

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Madison Cawthorns Insurrection - The New Yorker

None of that, however, was sufficient to persuade tens of millions of Trump voters that their candidate actually lost. On the contrary: When forced to choose between President Trumps baseless assertions and the conclusions of those Republicans duly charged with overseeing the election, these voters chose Mr. Trump over members of their own party who acted with integrity. The rioters on Jan. 6 turned to violence because they believed that the election was stolen, and they believed that despite all the authorities, Democrats and Republicans, actually responsible for running it saying otherwise.

Thats not a problem that can be solved by tinkering with the mechanics of elections oversight. Its entirely possible that worthwhile reforms to limit political grandstanding could fuel distrust by Democrats in the legitimacy of elections.

Take the Electoral Count Act, a particular focus of concern because of John Eastmans memo suggesting, absurdly, that it granted Vice President Mike Pence the authority to unilaterally set aside certified electoral votes. The act was originally passed to prevent a repeat of the disputed election of 1876, during which Congress previously responsible for resolving such disputes deadlocked over which electors to approve from three states that submitted dueling slates. The act reduced Congresss role and aimed to provide clear rules for how and when states must approve their slates to avoid disputes.

Those provisions can and should be clarified, to eliminate the possibility that a future vice president might do what Mike Pence refused to, or that future representatives and senators could baselessly undermine popular confidence in election integrity as numerous Republicans have done in the wake of the last election.

But what any such reform would do is push more authority back down to the state level or over to the judicial branch. What happens if those actors behave in a corruptly partisan manner? With key state legislatures in Republican hands and with the Supreme Court dominated by Republican appointees inclined to give latitude to those same state legislatures in setting electoral rules, its not hard to imagine many Democrats in 2024 concluding that by reforming the act they had disarmed themselves.

Some Democrats, therefore, have called for federalizing Americas unusually decentralized national elections, to override the possibility of partisan state legislature interference in either the conduct of the election or the vote count and certification of the winners. Because the Constitution vests a great deal of authority at the state level, some of these proposals might well face constitutional challenges but even if they passed muster, what would they achieve? They would invest more power in Congress, which might well be in Republican hands. How confident would Democrats be in an election in 2024 ultimately overseen by Kevin McCarthy in the House and Mitch McConnell in the Senate?

Nor would investing that power in another state-level authority be assured to fare better. After the 2020 election, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, was a hero for refusing to compromise his integrity. But in the 2000 election, the independent authority responsible for running the election in Florida was Secretary of State Katherine Harris, a Republican who was widely distrusted by Democrats for what they saw as favoritism to George W. Bush. This distrust was a mirror of Republicans own distrust of the recount process as conducted in a number of Democratically controlled counties in South Florida. It was distrust all the way up and all the way down. It ended only because Al Gore accepted the authority of the Supreme Court.

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Opinion | Imagine Its 2024, and Republicans Are Declaring Trump President - The New York Times

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthyKevin McCarthyCheney: Republicans who stuck by Trump 'will not be judged well by history' Twitter's Marjorie Taylor Greene ban fuels GOP attackson 'Big Tech' Democrats' loose talk of 'disqualification' still dangerous MORE (R-Calif.) will most likely be nominated and elected Speaker of the House a year from now when Congress convenes in January of 2023.

Here are ten things he should start promising that he will do when he takes the gavel from House Speaker Nancy PelosiNancy PelosiHillicon Valley Twitter's Greene ban boosts GOP attacks Cheney: Republicans who stuck by Trump 'will not be judged well by history' Capitol Police chief says he doesn't expect security threats on Jan. 6 anniversary MORE (D-Calif.).

First, he should insist on regular order.Doing things procedurally correct wont exactly light a fire under the GOP base, but voters instinctively understand that things have gone seriously off kilter during the reign of Pelosi.Do a real budget, devolve power back to the committees, pass the appropriations bills on time, go to real conferences with the Senate.Allow members to do their jobs and represent their constituents.

Second, he should end proxy voting.Both Democrats and Republicans have made use of this device that allows members to give their voting cards to other members while they sit at home and do who knows what.Members of Congress are paid to do their jobs by the taxpayers and they need to show up to do those jobs.

Third, he should immediately open the House buildings and the Capitol back to visitors and those who want to petition their government, as protected under the Constitution.The fact that members have been allowed to retreat behind the walls of Congress and keep the American people largely on the outside looking in is an embarrassment to this country.

Fourth, he should promise the Democrats that they can put whatever members from their caucus on whatever committees they want.He should make clear that what Nancy Pelosi did in kicking off members of the Republican Conference from committees was an outrageous abuse of power that had no precedent in House history and will not be replicated as long as Republicans are in power.There is no need to make a martyr out of Rep. Ilhan OmarIlhan OmarFeehery: What House Republicans should promise when they take over The 9 politicians who had the most impact in 2021 Democrats'selective hearingonlaw and orderissuesputs everyone at risk MORE (D-Minn.). Let her serve on whatever committee Rep. Hakeem JeffriesHakeem Sekou JeffriesFeehery: What House Republicans should promise when they take over House clears bill to raise debt limit House votes to hold defiant Meadows in criminal contempt MORE (D-N.Y.) deems appropriate.

Fifth, he should immediately launch a special committee to find out what the hell happened with our response to the COVID-19. Why has America done substantially worse than just about any other country?Why dont hospitals still have the capacity they need and still dont any good treatment protocols?What kind of propaganda campaign was launched by the Chinese communists?Why were voices of those who raised real questions about the strategic direction silenced?

Sixth, he should promise to pay the fines of those who broke autocratic rules of Nancy Pelosi, including those who refused to wear masks on the House floor and those members who refused to go through metal detectors.

Seventh, he should have the Judiciary Committee investigate what exactly happened with the violent protests of 2020, who funded those protests, how George Soros paid for the elections of prosecutors who refused to prosecute violent offenders, and how that led to the murders of the thousands of innocent civilians.

Eight, he should promise to hold Big Tech to account for stifling free speech.He should work with Democrats to find legislative solutions to break their monopoly power.He should launch an investigation into the fact-checking operations of Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.What conflicts of interest were present that compelled these companies to create narratives that led to more panic and less reasoned debate when it came to our COVID-19 response?Why did Twitter ban Alex Berenson and Donald TrumpDonald TrumpMissouri state GOP lawmaker resigns for Florida consulting job Trump to attend fundraiser for midterm candidates Biden meatpacking reforms lack punch, say critics MORE?

Ninth, he should have the Budget Committee and the Appropriations Committee launch a join investigation into what happened with all the money that was shoveled out the door in 2021. How much money was lost through fraud?How much money has been left unspent?How much did the states waste because they didnt know what to do with it? I betcha we will find that the federal government under the Biden administration wasted hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer money.

Finally, the Speaker should launch a task force, led by the Education and Labor Committee, to find out what exactly has gone wrong with our public school system.While much of this should be done at the state and local levels, the fact is that the National Education Association has an outsized influence in education policy and that influence has proven to be destructive to hopes and dreams of many young children.

Feehery is a partner at EFB Advocacy and blogs atwww.thefeeherytheory.com. He served as spokesman to former House SpeakerDennis HastertJohn (Dennis) Dennis HastertFeehery: What House Republicans should promise when they take over Democrats mull hardball tactics to leapfrog parliamentarian on immigration Feehery: A better than even shot of flipping a Texas district MORE(R-Ill.), as communications director to former House Majority Whip Tom DeLay (R-Texas), and as a speechwriter to former House Minority Leader Bob Michel (R-Ill.).

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Feehery: What House Republicans should promise when they take over | TheHill - The Hill

A Facebook post on the page of a Minnesota Republicans group promoted a candlelight vigil for individuals jailed in connection with the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol insurrection.

The now-deleted image appeared on the Facebook page of the Aitkin County Republicans, and was shared on Twitter Monday night by journalist Aaron Rupar.

The post advertised a candlelight vigil to be held Thursday the one-year anniversary of the violent incident to support "Jan 6 Patriot Prisoners."

The Minnesota DFL communications director replied to Rupar's post with screengrabs from comments the page left on its own post, detailing the time ("5:30 pm until whenever") and location (2nd Street NE in Aitkin).

"Even if they made mistakes, there is NO CONSTITUTIONAL JUSTIFICATION that they are STILL sitting in jail ONE YEAR later with no trial dates in sight!" one of the replies made under the Aitkin County Republicans group name reads.

"That post was unauthorized and not endorsed or even discussed by the Aitkin County Republican organization,"John Turonie, co-chair of Aitkin County Republicans, told Bring Me The News in an email.

He said the post was made by an individual who holds no official position with the organization, but who regularly attends their public meetings.

That individual is Jennifer Cummings.

"I'm absolutely astounded at the wide reach of this, it's just crazy," the 52-year-old told Cummings Bring Me The News.

Cummings said she is a member of the Aitkin County Republicans, not an officer, and recently was granted admin privileges on the group's Facebook page. She wanted to inform followers about her planned event, so on Monday evening shared it to the page.

Cummings believed it was a private group visible only to those interested not a public group.

After she hit publish, a rush of comments from non-members flooded the post and she quickly realized her mistake. Then, feeling sick she said, she deleted the post.

On Tuesday she took full responsibility for the post, saying it had not been discussed at a meeting, was not voted on by Aitkin County Republicans, and had nothing to do with Turonie or other officers.

"It's not the Aitkin County GOP trying to take a stance on this," she told Bring Me The News.

Cummings still plans to hold the event Thursday in Aitkin, saying she was inspired by a Facebook post she had recently seen, as well as a media story about Jan. 6 participants being held in jail as they await trial. She believes those individuals charged with a crime in connection to the actions at the Capitol building should go to trial, where they can be found innocent or guilty based on the evidence.

But she doesn't believe defendants should remain in custody as the criminal justice process plays out.

"We don't punish people before they're convicted of something," she said, adding she wants those defendants to know they have not been forgotten.

A total of 704 people, eight of them from Minnesota, have been charged in connection with Jan. 6, 2021. More than one in five suspects have pleaded guilty.

In September, the Washington Post said 78 defendants about 13%, at the time the story was published were still detained as they awaited trial on Jan. 6-related charges. Generally, about 75% of defendants facing federal charges are detained before trial, the paper said.

Some of the jailed Jan. 6 suspects have argued for pretrial release, Newsweek reported late last year, saying they are not a flight risk and not a threat to their communities

Prosecutors, however, have pushed back, saying the riot which occurred as U.S. lawmakers were attempting to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election represented an attack on the democratic process.

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Spotlight on Aitkin County Republicans group over Jan. 6 'candlelight vigil' post - Bring Me The News

Rep. Peter Meijer of Michigan said on Sunday said the GOP has "no alternative" to supporting former president Donald Trump.

Meijer made the remarks on NBC's Meet the Press with Chuck Todd when asked about why and how Trump has maintained a grip on the party despite being openly condemned by many Republicans following the January 6 insurrection.

"There was no alternative. There was no other path. And given how President Biden, when he was elected into office, you know, said he would be moderate and look for bipartisan solutions. But then after, and frankly, I blame the former president for this, after we lost the two senate seats in Georgia and the Senate flipped, it became an exercise in trying to be an LBJ or FDR style presidency and enact transformational change in the absence of any compelling mandate from the American people to do so," Meijer said.

"So that gave the rallying signal. That created a very steep divide, and at the end of the day, there's no other option right now in the Republican Party, and that's a sad testament," Meijer added.

Todd pushed back when Meijer blamed the divide on Biden, asking why it isn't up to Meijer himself, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, or Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy to "kick their Trump habit."

"If you have one party plummeting into the depths and the other just uses that as an excuse to go further, to go more to an extreme, to go more away from any sort of governing consensus, and towards trying to enact whatever the will of the most extreme constituency they have is, that is a recipe for both parties to drive further away from anything that resembles serving the American people as a whole," Meijer responded.

In the immediate aftermath of the attack on the Capitol, Republicans like McConnell and Sen. Lindsay Graham distanced themselves from Trump. On the Senate floor following the attack, Graham said, "Enough is enough."

Since then, Graham has changed his tune, saying that GOP leaders must have a relationship with the former president to be effective.

Trump has teased at a 2024 presidential run but has not committed yet. He plans on giving a speech on the anniversary of January 6 of this year from Mar-A-Lago.

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GOP rep says there's no other option right now to Republicans backing Trump - Business Insider

Of the 725 people arrested so far for the January 6 insurrection incited by Donald Trump, perhaps one of the most telling stories is that of the very first person sentenced, Anna Morgan-Lloyd. On Facebook, Morgan-Lloyd's attitude about participating in a violent attempt to overthrow democracy was jubilant, declaring it the "best day ever." But, when faced with the possibility of prison time, she masterfully escaped punishment by pretending to be reformed. After talking up all of the studying shedid in jail about the importance of democracy and evils of fascism she even claimed to have watched "Schindler's List" Morgan-Lloyd turned on the waterworks.

The act worked. Morgan-Lloyd was let off with a slap on the wrist, getting probation with no prison time. The judge seemed to sincerely believe her tale of being fooled into fascism and finding redemption through the magic of learning. This is why he was furious later to learn that Morgan-Lloyd's gut-wrenching show of remorse was all nonsense. Indeed, it was only a day after she was handedher light sentence that Morgan-Lloyd was telling lies on Fox News, saying "we see nobody damage anything" and the rioters were "actually very polite."

RELATED:It's time for Democrats to remind Republicans: The GOP is very much in the minority

In reality, the rioters did $1.5 million in damages, injured nearly 140 officers,and were so out of control that five people died on the scene. Many of the officers who defended the Capitol from the violent mob are still paying the priceone year later. Six months after the insurrection, 17 were still on leave due to injuries. Four have committed suicidein the past year. As officer Michael Fanone testified about that day, "I'm sure I was screaming, but I don't think I could even hear my own voice."

So was Morgan-Lloyd justdelusional? Did she not have eyes in her head? Was she unable to see the violence plainly visible in the overwhelming amount of video and photographic evidence of the day? No, of course not. As the judge who sentenced her later noted when issuing a harsher sentence to another rioter, hopes that her contrition was real were quickly "dashed."

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The lesson here is clear and should remain clear: Fascists lie. That is the nature of the authoritarian ideology, which doesn't valuegood faith discourse in a democracy. Indeed, they spit on democracy, or, as rioters in the Capitol reportedly did, they shit on it. All that the fascist respects is power and domination.Lying, if anything, is valorized in the authoritarian ideology because lying is an expression of power. To lie to someone else a judge, a journalist, randos on social media is a display of dominance over them and contempt for their petty attachment to Enlightenment values.

That bad faith is the lingua franca of fascism is not a new observation.Jean-Paul Sartre famously noted that fascists see lying as a delicious troll"for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words." All of which is why it's important not to take it at face value when Republicans claim to "believe" various lies around Trump's attempted coup, from the claim that the election was "stolen" to thejustifications rolled out for the rioters' behavior that day. None of it.

RELATED:Do GOP voters actually believe Trump's Big Lie about "rigged" elections? They don't act like they do

Unfortunately, the word "believe" still gets attached to the various nonsense Republican voters spout about the attempted coup. "Republicans who watch Fox News are more likely to believe false theories about Jan. 6," blareda Washington Post headline on a Monday morning analysis of new pollingabout what Americans say about the insurrection. "What makes someone think that the 2020 election was stolen?" writes Philip Bump in the opening paragraph.

It's important to note, however, that there's good reason to believe that Republicans do not actually believethe election was stolen. Nor should one assume they are legitimately deluded when they tell pollsterslies like "Trump didn't incite it" or "it was antifa" or "the protesters were peaceful" or "the attack was justified". As Heather "Digby" Parton noted Monday, "78% of Republicans now believe that Trump bears only a little or no responsibility for the attack, which is contradictory since they also profess to believe that the mob was protecting democracy."

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These contradictions between professed beliefs reflect the contradictory lies that are flowing from Fox News. Tucker Carlson, the most adamant rewriter of the coup's history, switches seamlessly between denying that the riot was an insurrection, claiming that the insurrection was a "false flag" orchestrated by the FBI and antifa, and claiming that the insurrectionists were justified. That each of these claims contradicts the other is of no matterbecause Carlson believes none of it, and neither do his viewers. They are engaged in a collective act of dissembling and gaslighting, deliberately filling the discourse with noise so they never have to actually defend what their true beliefs about the insurrection actually are.

So what isthattrue belief? Hard to say exactly under all that noise, but the likeliest one is that democracy is a threat to white supremacy, therefore democracy must be ended.This deeper, more unspeakable belief peeks out occasionally. We see it when Carlson claims that opposition to Trump's attempted coup and the insurrection is an attack on "legacy Americans," his latest clunky euphemism for the conservative white people he believes should be treated as the only legitimate Americans.

As Media Matters documented at the end of December, Fox News, and Carlson especially, spent the bulk of 2021 hyping the neo-Nazi "great replacement" theory. The theory starts from the assumption that white conservatives are entitled to be the dominant class in the U.S. From there, demographic changes are recast as a giant conspiracy against white people. The neo-Nazis explicitly say Jews are conspiring to "replace" white Christians with people of color that they supposedly can control. The Fox News creweuphemizes that by saying it's the "elites" or the "globalists." Either way, the same conspiracy theory bounces around the right-wing media ecosphere and creates a permission structure for conservative whites to treat racial diversity as an act of deliberate aggression. It's used tojustifytheir embrace of fascism and violence as an act of self-defense. It's the same game Nazis played by accusing Jews of secret conspiracies and it's for the same general purpose.

That's why it's so critical toabandonthe hope that Republicans are merely delusional when they parrot the Big Lie. As the judge who sentenced Anna Morgan-Lloyd learned to his regret, authoritarians will say whatever they feel they need to in order to evade accountability, whether consequences come inthe form of a prison sentence or merely having someone point out that they are racist. Fascists lie, especially to pollsters, who are viewed as part of the "elite" class of pro-democracy forcesthey are trying to destroy. Seeing them for who they are is the first step of fighting back effectively.

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Republican voters don't actually "believe" the Big Lie about January 6 they're in on the con - Salon