April 12, 2023 10:09 AM UTC

The Gaetz/Boebert Bebop Is Back: Take Note Durango

• 7 Comments
• by: Colorado Pols

The close business relationship between two of America’s most scandalous far-right members of Congress, Reps. Matt “Giggity” Gaetz of Florabama and Lauren Boebert representing Altamonte Springs Colorado’s Western Slope, continues with yesterday’s announcement that Gaetz and Boebert will co-host the upcoming La Plata County Lincoln Day Dinner in September. The Durango Herald reports:

Florida congressman and Trump-loyalist Matt Gaetz is slated to join Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District Rep. Lauren Boebert at the La Plata County Republican Central Committee’s annual Lincoln Day Dinner in September.

The pair arrested the nation’s attention in January when they played a critical role delaying the election of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. Gaetz has also denied the integrity of the 2020 election and was called out by McCarthy for jeopardizing the safety of fellow Republican lawmakers after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Shelli Shaw, who was recently named chairwoman of the La Plata County Republican Central Committee, said she is confident Gaetz and Boebert will energize the party’s base…

La Plata County stands out in Rep. Boebert’s generally GOP-favoring district as a Democratic stronghold, which Boebert lost heavily last November on the way to barely holding her seat by 546 votes. Former state house candidate-turned La Plata County GOP chair Shelli Shaw also lost decisively in her bid to unseat incumbent state Rep. Barbara McLachlan, along the way demonstrating an unsuitability for holding office of any kind:

During Shaw’s time as a candidate, the Colorado Times Recorder reported on a series of social media posts in which she said a second civil war was imminent and doubled down on her belief that President Joe Biden was elected by “dead people and fictitious book characters.”

So no, Shaw is probably not the best judge of the right messenger to appeal to swingable voters, in La Plata County or anywhere else. And as the final two holdouts who imperiled Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s ascension in January, there are plenty of Republicans with little use for this pair either. As for Boebert, she’s either fully aware and is deliberately trolling a part of her district she knows she can’t win, or she just adores Matt Gaetz enough not to care about public opinion. After all, Gaetz squeaked on the sex trafficking thing.

It’s an incredibly bad look in Durango, but maybe that’s the point.