Frazier Park, CA (Thursday and Friday, April 21-22, 2022)—The taped words of U.S. House of Representatives District 23 Congressman Kevin McCarthy (R-Bakersfield) burned through national newscasts on April 21, 2022. The national media reported the embarrassing objections by McCarthy’s Washington D.C. staff on Thursday, who adamantly denied that this Mountain Community’s congressman had discussed calling for President Donald J. Trump’s resignation following the January 6, 2021 invasion of the capitol building.
That mob attack led to five deaths of capital police and a rioter, injuries to 138 police officers and the suicides of four more. The deadly insurrection was intended to try to stop the certification of the votes of the November 2020 election—part of an elaborate effort to deny the former president had lost his reelection effort—”the big lie” that Trump still insists is fact today.
In a statement on Twitter early Thursday, “Mr. McCarthy called the reporting ‘totally false and wrong,'” The New York Times reported. Our Congressman’s spokesperson, Mark Bednar, denied that the Republican Minority Leader told colleagues he would urge Mr. Trump to leave office: “McCarthy never said he’d call Trump to say he should resign,” Mr. Bednar told reporters.
These denials were followed promptly by release of a taped conversation between McCarthy and Congresswoman Liz Cheney (R-Montana). It was posted on the New York Times website.
The tape is of McCarthy explaining his plan to suggest to Trump that he resign immediately to avoid an impeachment motion that would have the support of at least 17 Republicans in the U.S. House following the coup attempt.
The full research on this event will be released next week in a book, This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden and the Battle for America’s Future, by reporters Alexander Burns and , “which draws on hundreds of interviews with lawmakers and officials, plus recordings of private conversations.”
In McCarthy’s taped comments shortly after January 6, 2021, he expressed disgust for Trump’s support of the violent mob that chanted “Hang Mike Pence,” vandalized the House Speaker’s office, stole official documents and rampaged through the capitol building to suppress certification of the lawful national election.
McCarthy’s recorded comment to Cheney that “I’ve had it with this guy” [Trump] was widely carried throughout the country Thursday and Friday, April 21 and 22, in news reports with editorial notes about “the stupidity” of McCarthy denying his own words.
But for some of his constituents, the taped comments came as a relief. His words in the immediate aftermath of the January 6, 2021 effort to impede the peaceful Constitutional transfer of power confirm that it is neither stupidity nor Beltway Dementia that motivates McCarthy. His first response showed that the remnants of the man whom many here knew (when he worked as Bakersfield liaison to former U.S. Congressman Bill Thomas), still persist, according to constituents who called The Mountain Enterprise today.
But in January 2021, McCarthy’s principle-driven suggestions that Trump resign quickly flip-flopped into a flight to the Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida to double down in support of the former president’s big lie. McCarthy’s denials this week that he told colleagues of his desire to advise Trump to resign in the aftermath of the riot is evidence that our congressman’s sincerity about his oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution is outweighed by his drive for power. It appears his lust to become Speaker of the House with Trump’s assistance after this year’s midterm election is McCarthy’s guiding star.
The House Minority Leader is not stupid. He is blinded by ambition. In that, he has become disturbingly consistent.
—Patric Hedlund, Editor, The Mountain Enterprise
This is part of the April 15, 2022 online edition of The Mountain Enterprise.
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