Mainstream GOP group targets Bob Good as mission and members change
The Republican Main Street Partnership, a group that backs centrist Republicans in the House of Representatives, plans to spend half a million dollars trying to defeat Rep. Bob Good, a far-right lawmaker from Virginia. of Congress.
The move is notable not only because the group, through its campaigning arm, is inserting itself into the kind of intramural battle against an incumbent that it typically avoids. It is also notable because the candidate it supports – John J. McGuire, a former member of the Navy SEALs and an election denier who has 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 serve.
The nonprofit, which operates out of a mansion near the Capitol, has spent years raising and spending money to support vulnerable Republicans representing politically competitive districts, including centrist Republican lawmakers with more moderate positions on social issues. The headquarters on Capitol Hill acts as a kind of counterbalance to the Conservative Partnership Institute, which operates nearby as the nerve center of the right.
But as the Republican Party has moved toward the far right and purged itself of what was once a sizable and influential bloc of centrists, 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 many more conservatives, and has begun to focus less on centrism and bipartisanship and more on ridding Congress of Republican rebels bent on disrupting legislative business and deepening party divisions .
The decision to enter the Republican primary in a solidly Republican district in Virginia shows how the organization plans to take action against lawmakers who have played a major role in paralyzing the House of Representatives and making it difficult for the Republican majority to govern – even if it does. means elevating a far-right candidate he would never have supported in the past.
“We’re 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 set of vulnerabilities.
The most obvious of these is that Mr. Good alienated Mr. Trump by making the politically fateful mistake of supporting Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida in the early days of the Republican presidential primaries.
“Bob Good won’t be eligible again when we’re done with him,” Trump campaign manager Chris LaCivita said. told Cardinal News in January. The feud allows the Main Street Partnership to target Mr. Good aim 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 far-right brethren in the House of Representatives. “All they want is to stop everything, even their own business.”
The move comes as Chairman Mike Johnson has actively discouraged Republicans from targeting each other in the upcoming elections and trying — mostly unsuccessfully — to get his base to act as a more unified team.
The Republican Main Street Partnership has tried to unseat a sitting congressman only once before, in 2020, when it worked through its campaign arm to defeat 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 boost candidates whose leaders believe would work to achieve conservative policy outcomes.
The group’s leaders hope the work can help save the Republican Party from future breakdowns like the one it suffered in the House of Representatives this Congress, including two long and messy races for speakers and Republicans who routinely side with Democrats to prevent their party’s own legislation from being adopted. to the floor for votes.
But the decision to spend big on a sitting president also underscores how divided Republicans in Congress have become as the party has shifted to the right.
Mr. Good, who was elected chairman of the far-right House Freedom Caucus in December, was one of eight Republicans who voted last fall to remove Kevin McCarthy as chairman. He has tried to freeze the House by blocking procedural votes in protest against his own party’s leadership. He helped derail Republican-authored spending bills and said “most Americans won’t even miss government” if there is a shutdown.
His challenger, Mr. McGuire, a Virginia 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” who promoted a debunked 2020 election fraud conspiracy theory and has attacked Mr. Good for “abandoning” Mr. Trump.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the right-wing Republican from Georgia, is in favor.
In explaining her group’s decision to back Mr. McGuire, Ms. Chamberlain made clear that she is now more concerned about throwing rabble-rousers out of Congress than about elevating centrist Republicans, once the core mission of the organization.
“Supporting Trump and where he falls on the conservative spectrum plays no role in our decision-making,” Ms Chamberlain said. “John McGuire is committed to delivering conservative solutions, not burning down the House.”
Mr McGuire has said there is no time for “toxic infighting that is crippling 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 is not yet clear whether the Main Street Partnership will target other Republican establishment parties. Ms. Chamberlain said she had considered targeting Rep. Lauren Boebert, the right-wing Republican who is running in a crowded primary to succeed Rep. Ken Buck, who plans to leave Congress next week.
For now, she said she had decided it would be too expensive to try to clear the field in a race in which Ms. Boebert, who currently represents a more competitive district in western Colorado, has won Mr. Trump’s endorsement and is counting always has a campaign. cash advantage over the other candidates.
But Ms. Chamberlain said she hoped her organization could provide a safe haven for Republicans who want to focus on governing at a time when the party is divided and many lawmakers are fed up with Congress’s dysfunction.
On Tuesday, Mr. Buck, a staunch conservative who was also one of eight Republicans who voted to impeach Mr. McCarthy, announced his decision to shorten his final term in Congress. He told reporters that “things are going downhill here and I don’t need to spend any more time here.”
Others cling to the hope of a more functional future. New members of the Main Street Partnership include Reps. Max Miller of Ohio, a former official in the Trump administration; Kelly Armstrong of North Dakota; Buddy Carter from Georgia; and Andy Barr of Kentucky.
The organization also carries out a purification itself. She recently kicked out Rep. Nancy Mace, Republican of South Carolina. She voted to oust McCarthy last year and has taken a hard right turn toward Trumpism as she looks to secure her own political future.