If there’s one Republican member of Congress who deserves to be beaten in 2018 for the sole reason of smugness, it’s Rep. Dana Rohrabacher. In 2016, Rohrabacher’s California district went Democratic at the presidential level for the first time in decades, and he’s the Republican other than Donald Trump who Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy “joked” was being paid by Vladimir Putin. And yet, Dave Weigel reports:
And after he wrapped [a Memorial Day speech], retirees in star-spangled polo shirts chased him down to thank him and to say how well he’d done the other night on Fox News.
“These people aren’t going to vote for Democrats,” Rohrabacher said, strolling along the water on the way to his house. “A lot of Republican women voted for Hillary. That is not going to translate into anything else next year. Trump is a very boisterous guy, and that was a turnoff for some people, but these are Reagan-type conservatives.”
Well, no. These people aren’t going to vote for Democrats. The Fox News-watching retirees in star-spangled polo shirts who attend Memorial Day speeches by Republican members of Congress are going to remain Republicans. But there are other people in the district, too.
And while Rohrabacher’s support for Putin’s Russia may not involve possible collusion and obstruction and suspicious financial dealings as Trump’s does, it could still cause him problems if Russia stays in the news and Rohrabacher continues taking positions like blaming murdered DNC staffer Seth Rich for hacking that U.S. intelligence say was done by Russia.
In The Washington Post interview Sunday, he asked how the newspaper had been able to run an article saying definitively that a murdered DNC staffer had nothing to do with the release of party documents to WikiLeaks and other sites.
“I hope you’re wrong,” he said. “The story says these various people had determined that there was a Russian connection to the hacking. Well, I haven’t seen any. Can you tell me any conclusion where the Russians were involved?”
Is Putin good enough for you, Rep. Rohrabacher? But mostly, Rohrabacher’s smug complacency could hurt him in a time when his district is changing and Democrats are mobilized. Here’s hoping he never sees it coming.
Can you give $1 to each of the Democratic nominee funds in districts won by Hillary Clinton—including Rohrabacher's?