The Republican Main Street Partnership, a group that supports centrist Republicans in the House of Representatives, plans to pour half a million dollars into an attempt to defeat Rep. Bob Good, a right-wing Virginia lawmaker who is making an unusual push to to oust a sitting Republican member of Congress.
The move is notable not only because the group, through its campaign arm, is inserting itself into an internal battle against an incumbent it normally avoids. It’s also notable because the candidate it supports — John J. McGuire, a former member of the Navy SEALs and election denier who pledged allegiance to former President Donald J. Trump and promised to bring a “Biblical worldview” to Congress – bears so little resemblance to the kind of moderate Republicans the Main Street Partnership was founded to support.
The nonprofit, based in a townhouse just blocks from the Capitol, has for years raised and spent money to support at-risk Republicans who represent politically competitive districts, including centrist GOP lawmakers with more moderate positions on social issues. Its Capitol Hill headquarters serves as a sort of counterweight to the Conservative Partnership Institute, which serves as a nearby nerve center for the right.
But as the Republican Party has turned to the far right and separated from a once large and influential centrist bloc, the Main Street Partnership has also shed the “moderate” label and changed the nature of its mission. The group has recently expanded its membership to include far more conservatives and has begun to focus less on centrism and bipartisanship and more on ridding Congress of GOP rebels intent on disrupting legislative work and stoking partisan divisions .
Its decision to run in the GOP primary in a heavily Republican Virginia district shows how the organization plans to go on the offensive against lawmakers who have played a major role in paralyzing the House of Representatives and making it harder for the Republican majority governing — even if that means promoting a far-right candidate it would never have supported in the past.
“We are now a group of 90 members who just want to get things done,” said Sarah Chamberlain, president of the Main Street Partnership. She said the group identified Mr. Good as its first target this election year because of his unique vulnerabilities.
The most obvious of these is that Mr. Good angered Mr. Trump by making the politically fatal mistake of endorsing Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida in the early days of the Republican presidential primary.
“Bob Good won’t be electable when we’re done with him,” Chris LaCivita, Trump’s campaign manager, told Cardinal News in January. The feud allows the Main Street Partnership to target Mr. Good without fear of starting a proxy war with the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.
“We can’t have people like that in Congress; he doesn’t want to work together to get things done,” Ms. Chamberlain said of Mr. Good and his right-wing brethren in the House. “All they want to do is block everything, even their own stuff.”
The move comes as Speaker Mike Johnson has actively discouraged Republicans from targeting each other in the upcoming election and has tried – largely unsuccessfully – to rally his base to act as a more unified team.
The Republican Main Street Partnership has only tried to oust a sitting congressman once before, in 2020, when its campaign arm defeated former Rep. Steve King of Iowa, who made himself a party pariah with a series of racist comments.
This year, the group’s campaign arm, Defending Main Street, is also spending $2.5 million on largely open Republican primaries, hoping to bolster candidates who its leaders believe are committed to conservative policy outcomes would use.
The group’s leaders hope the work can help save the Republican Party from future collapses like the one the House has suffered during this Congress, including two long and messy races for speaker and Republicans routinely side with Democrats to prevent passage of their party’s own legislation coming to the floor for a vote.
But the decision to spend heavily against an incumbent also underscores how divided Republicans in Congress have become as the party has moved to the right.
Mr. Good, who was elected chairman of the right-wing House Freedom Caucus in December, was one of eight Republicans who voted to remove Kevin McCarthy as speaker last fall. He has worked to freeze the House floor by blocking procedural votes in protest at his own party’s leadership. He helped derail Republican-authored spending bills and said that “most Americans wouldn’t even miss the government” if there was a shutdown.
His challenger, Mr. McGuire, a Virginia state senator, also comes from the far right. He attended the “Stop the Steal” rally at the Ellipse on January 6, 2021, hosted a screening of the documentary “2000 Mules,” which promoted a debunked conspiracy theory about 2020 voter fraud, and attacked Mr. Good for I “let Mr. down.” Trump card.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the right-wing Republican from Georgia, is a supporter.
In explaining her group’s decision to support Mr. McGuire, Ms. Chamberlain made clear that she is now more concerned with driving agitators out of Congress than with promoting centrist Republicans, which was once the organization’s primary mission.
“Trump’s support and his placement on the conservative spectrum play no role in our decision-making,” Ms. Chamberlain said. “John McGuire is committed to finding conservative solutions, not burning down the House of Representatives.”
Mr McGuire said there was no time for “toxic infighting that is paralyzing our party and our country” and criticized Mr Good’s vote to oust Mr McCarthy.
Mr. Good’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
It’s not yet clear whether the Main Street Partnership will target other Republican incumbents. Ms. Chamberlain said she had considered targeting Rep. Lauren Boebert, the right-wing Republican who is running in a crowded primary to replace Rep. Ken Buck, who plans to leave Congress next week.
She said she had concluded for now that it would be too expensive to run in a race in which Ms. Boebert, who currently represents a more competitive district in western Colorado, has received Mr. Trump’s endorsement and is still running a campaign. to clear the field of monetary advantage over the other candidates.
But Ms. Chamberlain said she hopes her organization can provide a safe haven for Republicans who want to focus on governing at a time when the party is fractured and many lawmakers are fed up with dysfunction in Congress.
On Tuesday, Mr. Buck, a staunch conservative who was also one of the eight Republicans who voted to remove Mr. McCarthy, announced his decision to shorten his final term in Congress, telling reporters: “This place is fine “I don’t need to spend any more time here.”
Others remain hopeful for a more functional future. The Main Street Partnership’s new members include Reps. Max Miller of Ohio, a former Trump administration official; Kelly Armstrong of North Dakota; Buddy Carter of Georgia; and Andy Barr of Kentucky.
The organization is also conducting its own cleanup. She recently ousted Rep. Nancy Mace, Republican of South Carolina, who voted to oust McCarthy last year and has made a rightward shift toward Trumpism to secure her own political future.
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2024-03-16 03:11:58
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