December 20, 2018 12:22 PM UTC

Post-Peak Cory Gardner: The Failures Pile Up

• 5 Comments
• by: Colorado Pols

UPDATE: 9NEWS’ Kyle Clark sums it up:

For shuck's sake, Sen. Cory Gardner's having a rough week. pic.twitter.com/bFfmc3AuC8

— Next with Kyle Clark (@nexton9news) December 21, 2018

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It’s shaping up to be another bad news week for GOP Sen. Cory Gardner of Colorado, already making shortlists as one of 2020’s most vulnerable U.S. Senators, as legislative failures combine with the latest Trump foreign policy debacle to leave Gardner unable to catch a break. That’s the most sympathetic spin you can put on these developments, which bear an eerie similarity to the downward trajectory of another Colorado Republican as we’ll explain:

U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., vowed Tuesday to continue to push for the passage of his states’ rights marijuana measure after his proposed amendment to the criminal justice reform measure the Senate passed later in the day was rejected…

Gardner’s request for a unanimous consent vote to add the amendment to the criminal justice reform measure was rejected by Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, according to the Senate Press Gallery.

Gardner’s support for normalizing the marijuana industry with respect to banking and federal enforcement against activities legal at the state level is in line with the wishes of Colorado voters, but not with Gardner’s conservative Republican base in the state which is increasingly convinced that marijuana legalization has been a culture-war disaster. The death of this legislation after Gardner failed to persuade senior GOP Senators to go along only underscores Gardner’s inherent weakness to make progress on marijuana to supporters of that industry, while deepening Gardner’s divide on the right with conservative Republicans.

That means politically, it’s a lose-lose for Cory Gardner. And the STATES Act wasn’t the only red-on-red legislative failure for Gardner this week, as another bipartisan bill Gardner very publicly supported was blocked by a fellow Republican, reauthorization of the Land and Water Conservation Fund. CNN’s Manu Raju covered the action late yesterday:

Cory Gardner now yelling at Mike Lee on the floor, saying, “I’m pretty doggone upset” that he blocked a vote, slamming his hand on the desk https://t.co/w8ktk9OB80

— Manu Raju (@mkraju) December 20, 2018

As on the issue of marijuana, Gardner has enjoyed a large helping of credit for his support for reauthorization of the LWCF, which Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell promised suggested would could come back for consideration in January, but at the end of the day Gardner is part of the Republican majority that also includes Utah Sen. Mike Lee (R-Sagebrush Rebellion). Just like Rep. Mike Coffman on immigration, protestations that Gardner’s own party is scuttling bills he supports are cold comfort to the voters who only care about results.

And finally, as you may have heard, President Donald Trump is pulling out of Syria, and Sen. Gardner is…well, “doggone upset.”

I urge President Trump to immediately halt any plans to withdraw US troops from Syria and to consult with Congress on a long-term Syria strategy that protects US national interests and denies a win for Vladimir Putin, Bashar al-Assad, and the Iranian mullahs.

— Cory Gardner (@SenCoryGardner) December 19, 2018

Trump’s decision to unilaterally withdraw American forces from Syria, leaving the fight against ISIS in that country in the hands of the Russians and their murderous dictator ally is a stunning retreat from the United States’ historic responsibility to prevent aggression against civilians and international terrorism–with seemingly no purpose other than to gratify Russia’s geopolitical aims. If President Barack Obama had proposed something this radically out of step with overwhelming bipartisan consensus, Republicans would have called for impeachment, not a mere change of mind.

In all of these different stories, the theme tying them all together is Cory Gardner’s powerlessness to alter the course plotted by his fellow Republicans. Just like we did for years with now-defeated Rep. Mike Coffman, we can argue about the sincerity of Gardner’s positions–but the bottom line is the same. Because the party in power is responsible, and Gardner is a leadership member of that party, he is part of the problem, not the solution.

The more the failures pile up, the more necessary it becomes to step back and process this larger truth.