Welcome to what is the 882nd original profile here at “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day”, where we’ll be discussing the sitting U.S. House Representative from Maryland’s 1st Congressional District, Andy Harris, who was first elected to office in… yes, of course, the 2010 Tea Party Wave, after a failed Congressional campaign in 2008, and prior to that, a full decade in the Maryland State Senate from 1999-2009. That failed 2008 campaign involved Harris unseating incumbent GOP Congressman Gary Gilchrest by running to his right, and claiming that Gilchrest, a Vietnam veteran, was not truly supportive enough of the Iraq War during his time in Congress. Gilchrest ended up supporting Democrat Frank Kratovil in the general election, forcing Harris to try again in 2010. And Gilchrest is still disgusted with him until this day… which is understandable, given the circumstances.Including the fact that Harris, a physician, ran for office by whipping up paranoia about the Affordable Care Act. But during his orientation in late 2010, he threw a tantrum that he would not be given health insurance immediately, and would have to wait all of two months until he was sworn in before it would kick in. Let us repeat that… the main who campaigned against socialized healthcare practically s*** himself in rage that he would have to wait two months to get some of it for himself.
Harris, the only Republican member of the Maryland delegation in the House, comes to our attention because while we would like to say he’s a son of a Hungarian immigrant father and Polish immigrant mother and that should make him a good example of a Republican with attitudes towards immigration… but no, it’s quite worse than that. Andy Harris likes to remember his father, Zoltan Harris, as a man who was taken to a Russian gulag for being a determined anti-Communist soldier… the timeline of that, however, neglects to mention that Zoltan Harris fought for the pro-Hitler Hungarian army that was fighting the Allies during World War II.
So, yes, neglecting to mention that your father was pro-Nazi is a concern.More of a concern… the support for Hungarian fascists did not skip a generation, as Andy Harris has come out hard in support of Hungarian strongman and Putin ally Viktor Orban, actually writing it down on Congressional letterhead. And he’s snuck across the pond to speak at events in Budapest in favor of Orban, with his opening act being Sharon Slater, the head of an anti-LGBTQ hate group from Arizona who thinks that homosexuality is a “mental disorder” caused by childhood trauma that can be treated with gay conversion therapy. But Harris has gone as far as to write the U.S. State Department and ask them to pull the financial support our government gives towards journalists in Hungary, who, y’know, report on human rights violations being committed by Orban’s regime.
But that is not the only far-right Eastern European country where Harris has shown interest… in 2018, Harris planned to visit far-right Czech white nationalist Tomio Okamura with a delegation of true Congress-critters that included Dana Rohrabacher, Louie Gohmert, Paul Gosar, and of course, the ultimate racist in the House, Steve King. Not for nothing, but if your dad was in a pro-Nazi group and you didn’t hold the same ideals, maybe you wouldn’t want to hang out with trash like Okamura, who had called for the gassing of Jews, gays, and Roma.
But Andy Harris is not discriminating in the company he keeps, or political endorsements he gives… as in 2017, he endorsed Roy Moore even AFTER the public learned Moore had a long history of predatory behavior towards young girls (to say nothing of the rampant racism and homophobia). It's not a one off, where he sticks up for the worst people. After all, 2018, Harris came out hard in defense of Brett Kavanaugh, making accusations that his highly credible accuser, Christine Blasey Ford, was just “a troubled woman”, and her testimony should be disregarded.I mean, there is no bottom for how gutless Andy Harris can be.
He might pretend to be a patriot, but it’s hard to claim that when you go and vote against healthcare for 9-11 First Responders and call the Zadroga Act “fiscally irresponsible”. Or how in 2018 he was caught funneling campaign dollars to his wife illegally and was slapped with an ethics violation.
This has continued into current events, as he’s started feuding with fellow Republican and Maryland Governor Larry Hogan for responsibly keeping his state’s business closed during the Covid-19 pandemic. Harris compared Hogan’s “stay at home” order that applied to church services to “Communist China” and “North Korea”. Hogan, to his credit, blew Harris off, saying, “he’s got a right to say whatever crazy things he wants to say”.
If all this wasn’t enough, then there’s his partisan voting record…
- On January 5th, 2011, Rep. Harris votes the first attempt by Republicans to repeal the Affordable Care Act. This would be the first of scores of times he tries to kill the ACA over the next 8 years.
- On February 18th, 2011, Andy Harris votes to defund Planned Parenthood.
- March 17th, 2011: Rep. Harris votes to cut funding to National Public Radio.
- January 15th, 2013: Andy Harris votes against Disaster Relief Funding for victims of Hurricane Sandy.
- February 28th, 2013: Harris votes against the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.
- June 19th, 2013: Andy Harris votes against restoring $20.5 billion towards the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program.
- September 30th, 2013: Rep. Harris votes for the 2013 Government Shutdown. When the vote came up seventeen days later to re-open the government, Harris voted to keep it closed.
- Feb 26th, 2014: Andy Harris goes "all in" on the faux-scandal surrounding the IRS researching SuperPACs by voting for the "Stop the Targeting of Political Beliefs by the IRS Act".
- July 10th, 2014: Harris votes for House Amendment 1040, to prevent the implementation of the dreaded United Nations Agenda 21 Treaty, because conspiracy theorists were paranoid about climate change being used for global domination.
- January 22nd, 2015: Andy Harris votes for HR 7, an anti-abortion bill that makes even some Republicans pause before voting for it because of its language that tries to define the conditions for what “rape” is, in it.
- March 3rd, 2015: Harris votes against funding the Department of Homeland Security as part of a Republican protest of President Obama’s executive orders on immigration.
- September 11th, 2015: Harris votes against the United States' nuclear treaty with Iran.
- September 18th, 2015: Rep. Harris votes for a bill with most House Republicans to defund Planned Parenthood, based on highly edited “sting” videos submitted by a Pro-Life advocacy group that were repeatedly debunked by investigators.
- November 19th, 2015: Harris votes for the American Security Against Foreign Enemies Act, reacting to the terror attacks in Paris by jihadists from France and Belgium by trying to create greater restrictions to keep out Syrian refugees, of whom exactly zero were involved in those attacks.
- February 16th, 2017: Harris votes for HJR 69, to make it legal for hunters on wildlife reserves to kill several species of hibernating bears or wolves while they’re sleeping.
- March 16th, 2017: Andy Harris votes for HR 1181, which would allow veterans deemed mentally incompetent to continue to own firearms, and not have them taken away without a judge's written order.
- May 4th, 2017: Harris votes for the GOP's healthcare plan, that would allow 24,000 more people to die a year. Oh, and a provision in the bill would make sure that Harris would be allowed to keep his healthcare plan as it exists under the ACA, which would be repealed for the rest of the country. He and his Republican compatriots threw themselves a beer bash to celebrate taking away healthcare from millions and then gloated about it with Donald Trump at a White House press conference.
- June 8th, 2017: Andy Harris votes for HR 10, the GOP’s attempt to repeal Dodd-Frank financial reform, because what the country really needs is to allow the big banks to make the same mistakes that imploded the economy only a decade earlier.
- October 3rd, 2017: Harris votes for HR 36, the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, that would try to create an unconstitutional ban abortion at 20 weeks (even though medical science tells us fetuses do not have the capability to feel pain until 29 weeks).
- December 19th, 2017: Andy Harris votes for HR 1, the GOP’s $1.7 trillion tax cut to benefit the wealthiest Americans and corporations permanently that coincidentally also removes the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate and kicks 13 million people off their health insurance.
- February 18th, 2018: Rep. Harris and his fellow Republicans decide that poor big businesses are suffering too much at the hands of the Americans with Disabilities Act too much, and vote for HR 620, which would strip most of the civil rights protections guaranteed by it.
- January 22nd, 2019: Harris votes against HR 676, which would prevent Donald Trump from doing the unthinkable and walking away from our allies in NATO to appease the Russians.
- January 23rd, 2019: Rep. Harris voted against HR 648, because he was gleefully enjoying the longest government shutdown in history.
- January 27th, 2019: Andy Harris votes against HJR 30, which was meant to express disapproval of Donald Trump not acting against Russian Federation for attack Harris our democracy.
- February 28th, 2019: Harris votes against HR 1112, a bill which would have required universal background checks on all firearm purchases, and close the gun show loophole.
- March 7th, 2019: Harris votes against HR 183, a resolution to condemn anti-Semitism as a hateful extension of intolerance.
- March 14th, 2019: Rep. Harris votes against HJR 46, which sane members of Congress voted for to reject Donald Trump’s “national emergency” regarding the U.S. border and his attempts to reallocate funds for a border wall without Congressional approval.
- April 4th, 2019: Andy Harris is one of 158 Republicans who choose to vote against the re-authorization of the Violence Against Women Act, likely because they feel the 2nd Amendment remaining absolute is more important than preventing people with a history of domestic abuse from owning a firearm (which statistics show, makes them more likely to use those firearms against women in their lives).
- May 17th, 2019: Harris votes against The Equality Act, which would have prevented discrimination towards Americans based on their gender identity or sexual orientation.
- June 4th, 2019: Rep. Harris votes against the Dreamers Act, because he’s too xenophobic and partisan to care about immigration reform.
- July 12th, 2019: Harris is one of 12 Republicans who vote against the re-authorization of the Zadroga Act to provide healthcare to 9/11 First Responders.
- July 16th, 2019: Andy Harris votes against a resolution to condemn Donald Trump for his racist statements that four people of color in Congress should “go back where they came from”.
Maryland’s 1st Congressional District has a +14 Republican lean, which is amazing considering out of the rest of the state’s districts, the next most conservative is a +6 Democratic lean. Andy Harris isn’t likely to go anywhere unless he gets a primary challenge… but that could be more likely given with Steve King on his way out in January, the man with the next most conspicuous ties to European white nationalists is easily Harris. He’s currently starting to feel the pressure that’s sure to come in November when Donald Trump serves as the albatross upon the entire GOP’s ancient mariner. He’s been spotted by the DC media screaming at White House staff. Even if he survives re-election in 2020… after redistricting in 2020, Harris could be looking at a very different district that won’t make his presence at the Capitol as easy.
At least, we hope not. The less folks buddying up to white nationalists in Congress that we have, the better.
One Year Ago, June 21st, 2019: Brad Schimel (WI)… 2019 Update
Two Year Ago, June 21st, 2018: Brad Schimel (WI)… 2018 Update
Three Years Ago, June 21st, 2017: Brad Schimel (WI)… 2017 Update
Four Years Ago, June 21st, 2016: Brad Schimel (WI)… 2016 Update
Five Years Ago, June 21st, 2015: Brad Schimel (WI)… Original Profile