As a former Republican member of the House of Representatives, here are the collective inner thoughts of a great majority of Capitol Hill Republicans, as they would speak to themselves:
{mosads}“This Comey firing has thrown me for a loop; I didn’t see it coming — and I am not buying what I am hearing about it from the White House. Prior to this week, my thoughts about the president had been this:
- Trump is ‘different’ each time I meet him.
- I do not know the man — he seems distant and not really focused during the times I have met with him — always in a group of my fellow Republicans; I’ve never had a one-on-one with him; he always has a room full of staffers surrounding him.
- He is polite and seemingly affable — but under the surface I detect a restlessness; he shakes your hand but looks right through you.
- We all took note after the first go-round of the Health Care bill when he tweeted several blasts about ‘defeating’ the Freedom Caucus and the Dems in the same tweet!
- OK … the Freedom Caucus can be a little nutty at times … but, hey, they are ‘our’ nuts; to equate them to Pelosi and Schumer and those lefties was way, way too much.
- I am afraid of incurring the wrath of Trump and then get blasted by him either in a tweet or verbally; in fact, most of my colleagues in the cloakroom have said, ‘I’ll do anything to keep that guy from coming after me!’
- Because what I am really afraid of are the Trump voters…that die-hard bloc of voters who will stick with him even if he ‘stand(s) in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot(s) somebody.‘ That bloc is also in my district and if, in a GOP primary against me, Trump supported my opponent, I could lose my seat.
- That’s why we all voted for a turkey of a healthcare bill: just to get Trump off our backs and let him abuse the Senate for the next few months.
- Over dinner — and away from staff — most GOP members shake their heads about Trump;
- And then came the Comey firing.
- There is now a feeling that there really is something ‘there’ in the Russian collusion investigation — and that is the real reason behind the Comey firing.
- The awful polls numbers for President Trump — and for Congressional Republicans in 2018 — came before this Comey firing; what are they going to be now?
- I’d never say this anywhere, any time, but my first, second and third consideration is getting myself re-elected in 2018.
- If I have to suck up to Trump to do it, I’ll do it. I don’t like it, but I want to stay here.
- But this Comey thing is making it harder and harder to see how any of this can end well.
- My town halls are already brutal with question after question about pre-existing conditions and premiums and deductibles…but I dread the Comey questions I am certain to soon get.
- Comey has always been considered a Boy Scout; and all the Republicans loved him and considered him the most honest man in D.C..
- Now Trump is denigrating him and I don’t believe what the White House is saying about why they fired him.
- I also don’t get this fixation that Trump has with Putin. Putin, of all people? Are you kidding me?
- We, on the right, have for years loved to hate Putin. Now we are supposed to think well of him?
- What do Trump and he have going on that we don’t know about?
- None of my colleagues get it either.
- Now, this news about barring the White House Press Corps from the Oval Office — and, instead, letting the Russian media in there — the day after sacking Comey?
- Are you kidding me?
- Oh, how I dread my next town hall…”
John LeBoutillier was a Republican Member of the House of Representatives (N.Y.’s 6th District) from 1981-1983. He is the co-host of REVOLUTION_The Podcast.
The views expressed by contributors are their own and are not the views of The Hill.