Politics - News Analysis

GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger Finally Calls Out Lauren Boebert’s Dangerous Jan. 6th Tweet: ‘We Need to Know’

Representative Adam Kinzinger, a GOP congressman from Illinois, clearly had some things to get off his chest going into this July 4th weekend, our nation’s most patriotic holiday. He opened up in a New York Times profile with more courage than we’ve seen from any politician from either side in quite a while. In short, Kinzinger called his entire party out, and even though he’s spoken out strongly before, he’s never been this honest, nor this specifically penetrating.

We do want to note, that in the past, we’ve read reports that he’s lost relationships with family members over these issues and received the threats one would expect when opposing the MAGAs. This is courageous.

The essay-interview is far too long to do much justice in one column here. We will focus on two elements, both pertaining to his party’s handling of January 6th and his fears going forward. First, he clearly fears Trump’s power over the Republican “would be” leader in the House because McCarthy shamelessly changed his January 6th position 180 degrees after just a few hours in Mar-a-Lago:

“Kevin gave a great speech the week after that, and then he went to Mar-a-Lago and charged the paddles and brought Trump back to life,” 

“That’s the moment when I realized, Oh, man, this is a problem. You come to understand that when the party and party leaders talk about unity, and in the same breath, say that Donald Trump is the leader of the Republican Party, what they’re talking about isn’t unity. They’re talking about capitulation.

When under the guise of unity, you act like Jan. 6 was just whatever you want to make of it, that is capitulating to a false narrative and to a dangerous attack on democracy. I will certainly talk to Kevin if he wants to. But I don’t see how we’re ever going to come eye-to-eye on this until there is a recognition that we can’t be the party of insurrection.”

People have discussed McCarthy’s quick turn before, it was just that obvious. But Kinzinger then took on a topic that we have not heard addressed by any Republican.  He calls Lauren Boebert out by name and by deed, and damned well wants answers regarding her January 6th tweet:

“I will say, if you just looked at Twitter — the whole reason I brought my gun and kept my staff home and told my wife to stay in the apartment was looking at Twitter.

I saw the threats. When Lauren Boebert — I will call her out by name — tweeted ‘Today is 1776,’ I don’t know what that meant other than this is the time for revolution. Maybe it was a dumb tweet that she didn’t mean. Fine. I’ll give her that credit for now. But if you have members of Congress who were involved in nurturing an insurrection, heck yeah, we need to know.”

He doesn’t have the facts he needs to directly accuse another member of Congress of prior knowledge or participation in the attempted coup. But he puts her on notice and demands an answer. It is farther than we’ve seen anyone in government go. When Nancy Pelosi said that perhaps some of the enemies were in the House, she did not name names. Kinzinger did.

Yes, we need answers as to how McCarthy pivoted in hours and what Boebert knew. At least this Republican is out front demanding them and doing so at his own risk.

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Peace, y’all
Jason
[email protected] and on Twitter @JasonMiciak

 

 

meet the author

Jason Miciak is a political writer, features writer, author, and attorney. He is originally from Canada but grew up in the Pacific Northwest. He now enjoys life as a single dad raising a ridiculously-loved young girl on the beaches of the Gulf Coast. He is very much the dreamy mystic, a day without learning is a day not lived. He is passionate about his flower pots and studies philosophical science, religion, and non-mathematical principles of theoretical physics. Dogs, pizza, and love are proof that God exists. "Above all else, love one another."

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