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It appears House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy didn’t think January 6th was “legitimate political discourse” in the days after the attack on the Capitol.
After January 6th, McCarthy and other House GOP leadership members wanted Trump to resign and create a “post-Trump” House Republican party.
But…”none of the men followed through on their tough talk in those private conversations.”
Now nearly 16 months later, the NRCC (having Trump headline their fundraiser in May) and GOP candidates across the country are running in Trump’s image – keeping the flame of his lies about the 2020 election burning bright.
Below are excerpts from this morning’s New York Times story from Alex Burns and Jonathan Martin’s new book, “This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden and the Battle for America’s Future.”
McCarthy was done with Trump:
Mr. McCarthy went so far as to say he would push Mr. Trump to resign immediately: “I’ve had it with this guy,” he told a group of Republican leaders.
McCarthy wanted Trump to resign:
On Jan. 10, Mr. McCarthy spoke again with the leadership team and this time he had a plan in mind. The Democrats were driving hard at an impeachment resolution, Mr. McCarthy said, and they would have the votes to pass it. Now he planned to call Mr. Trump and tell him it was time for him to go. “What he did is unacceptable. Nobody can defend that and nobody should defend it,” he told the group. Mr. McCarthy said he would tell Mr. Trump of the impeachment resolution: “I think this will pass, and it would be my recommendation you should resign.”
Called January 6th atrocious and wrong:
On a phone call with several other top House Republicans on Jan. 8, Mr. McCarthy said Mr. Trump’s conduct on Jan. 6 had been “atrocious and totally wrong.” He faulted the president for “inciting people” to attack the Capitol, saying that Mr. Trump’s remarks at a rally on the National Mall that day were “not right by any shape or any form.”
McCarthy inquired about the 25th amendment:
Mr. McCarthy inquired about the mechanism for invoking the 25th Amendment — the process whereby the vice president and members of the cabinet can remove a president from office — before concluding that was not a viable option.
McCarthy wanted to strip far-right members of their twitter accounts:
During the same Jan. 10 conversation when he said he would call on Mr. Trump to resign, Mr. McCarthy told other G.O.P. leaders he wished the big tech companies would strip some Republican lawmakers of their social media accounts, as Twitter and Facebook had done with Mr. Trump. Members such as Lauren Boebert of Colorado had done so much to stoke paranoia about the 2020 election and made offensive comments online about the Capitol attack. “We can’t put up with that,” Mr. McCarthy said, adding, “Can’t they take their Twitter accounts away, too?”
NRCC Chairman Tom Emmer wanted to censure Trump & Steve Scalise wanted to created a “Post-Trump Republican House”:
Other Republican leaders in the House agreed with Mr. McCarthy that the president’s behavior deserved swift punishment. Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the second-ranking House Republican, said on one call that it was time for the G.O.P. to contemplate a “post-Trump Republican House,” while Representative Tom Emmer of Minnesota, the head of the party’s House campaign committee, suggested censuring Mr. Trump. Yet none of the men followed through on their tough talk in those private conversations.
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