The youngest member of what I’m calling the Young Right-Wing Crazies Caucus, Rep Madison Cawthorn (R-NC), faced a primary opponent last night in his first try at reelection … and lost. From CNN/Politics:
The result is by only a few hundred votes, but reportedly Cawthorn has conceded rather than wrestling violently for his position.
Which is odd.
Steve Benen summarizes the blunders that leaves the 26 year old looking at unemployment starting early next year:
It’s difficult to rank each of Cawthorn’s many scandals, screw-ups, and failures — the list is not short — but one recent incident was largely responsible for derailing his career. As regular readers know, the congressman appeared on a podcast in March and was asked whether the TV show “House of Cards” is realistic. He said he couldn’t help but marvel at the “sexual perversion” of his older colleagues, adding that his congressional colleagues had invited him to orgies and done cocaine in his presence.
House Republicans will tolerate an astonishing amount of misconduct, but this crossed a line: Cawthorn making up nonsense about them was seen as a bridge too far. The North Carolinian conceded that much of what he’d claimed was “exaggerated” — he also claimed not to know “what cocaine is” — but much of the GOP was underwhelmed by his explanation and turned on him with a vengeance.
It’s not hard to visualize this young man, faced with a question out of the entertainment world, and with a background of saying outrageous and possibly false things, jumping at the opportunity to be, well, entertaining. After all, this is the Age of Entertainment, as I occasionally remind friends. He was just going with the flow of his age group.
And lying had not hurt him before, no?
It all ties together with his immediate concession to his opponent, too. The last few weeks have seen his more senior colleagues, outraged at his infamous charges, working against him. Winning this primary, and almost certainly the general election, would result in a position of isolation, with only the other members of the Young Right-Wing Crazies Caucus, plus a few nuts-loose Representatives such as Gosar, etc, to keep him company.
Maybe.
I suspect he welcomes this loss, or should. He may have trouble finding a new political position, presumably as ‘consultant,’ but look for him to try. He might even resign from Congress before then.
And maybe reconsider his role as ‘entertainer.’
