Because Donald Trump isn't enough for House Speaker Paul Ryan and his leadership team to worry about:
Lawmakers and political operatives aligned with House GOP leadership are growing increasingly concerned that the powerful conservative outside group Club for Growth is taking marching orders from their arch-nemesis: The House Freedom Caucus.
The Club's super PAC has spent more than $3.7 million to boost a half-dozen Republican primary candidates who've pledged publicly or privately to join the Freedom Caucus, plus several of their current members in tough races. Some of the candidates' policy positions are at odds with the Club's positions, raising eyebrows among its detractors. The group's latest endorsee, Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), surprised many: The group spent more than $600,000 against him four years ago after Gosar earned a middling 63 percent on its internal scorecard, in part because of his votes on spending bills.
The Club for Growth is denying that it's working with the Freedom Caucus, and that their "conservative views simply happen to align with the Freedom Caucus" but at the same time every one of the Club-backed House candidates this year is either a member of or endorsed by the Freedom Caucus.
It's another major headache for Speaker Paul Ryan as he can't afford to lose any allies in holding off the Freedom Caucus and the Club-aligned members helped him with that somewhat. He certainly doesn't want the Freedom group of maniacs getting any larger or more powerful.
Can you chip in $3 to get more Democrats into the House and make Paul Ryan's headaches even bigger?
It's also creating another fun front in the GOP civil war:
“I was a Club-endorsed candidate when I first ran for Congress. I had to go through a very thorough interview by a committee of Club members at their office … to make sure I agreed with their issues,” said retiring Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-Ga.), who recently backed a candidate going up against a Club- and Freedom Caucus-endorsed hopeful. “Now I’m told that the Club is taking a different approach. Now all a candidate has to do is be endorsed by the House Freedom Caucus Chairman Jim Jordan.” […]
Westmoreland added that the Club is "spending their members’ money on candidates that don’t necessarily line up with their core principles on immigration or free trade. I don’t understand the coordination and I would think it would be a surprise to Club members.”
Here's a tip for Westmoreland. The Club for Growth isn't any less extreme than the Freedom Caucus, just less overtly Trumpist. The tea party and the Freedom Caucus are just the natural outgrowth of the Club's anti-government, anti-tax, anti-anything good existence. He helped build the GOP of 2016. Club spokesman Doug Sachtleben admits it: "we love what [the Freedom Caucus is] doing, and we’re looking for members so that we can get a majority of economic conservatives within the majority of Republicans so they can have a more influential role."
And Paul Ryan watches his presidential aspirations circle the drain.