July 18, 2023 12:32 PM UTC

Republicans Perplexed by Boebert's Commitment to Nonsense

• 23 Comments
• by: Colorado Pols

Congressperson Lauren Boebert (R-ifle) just can’t stop being Lauren Boebert…and it may damn well mean the end of her short political career.

After narrowly winning re-election in 2022 — beating Democrat Adam Frisch by a mere 546 votes in a district that SHOULD be safe for a Republican — Boebert briefly seemed to indicate that she was interested in turning over a new leaf to “take down the temperature in [Washington] DC.”

The “New Boebert” had a shorter shelf life than “New Coke.”

We know from polling data that voters in the third congressional district view Boebert with — at best — a healthy dose of skepticism, believing that she is more interested in social media and defending Donald Trump than she is in delivering results for her constituents. Boebert seems to understand that voters want her to actually DO HER JOB, which is why she had a very public change of heart about earmarks in general (but not before members of Colorado’s delegation had gotten fed up with Boebert’s habit of taking credit for things she voted against).

Boebert seems to know what she SHOULD be doing differently, but she appears to be utterly incapable of making those changes consistently. After a week in which Boebert made a fool of herself on the annual military funding bill (check out this report from Kyle Clark of 9News), we learned that Frisch had once again outperformed the incumbent on the fundraising front. Frisch raised THREE TIMES as much money as Boebert in Q2, bringing home $2.6 million compared to just $818,000 for Boebert. 

Boebert’s inexplicable refusal to do the things that might actually get her re-elected has drawn national attention — and plenty of head-scratching from Republicans. Take a look at what Scott Wong and Sahil Kapur reported for NBC News on Monday:

Frisch is now seeking a rematch — and Boebert, a conservative firebrand and culture warrior, hasn’t moderated her policy positions or toned down her rhetoric in her second term on Capitol Hill. Instead, Boebert has been attracting national headlines for taking on President Joe Biden — and her own GOP leadership. [Pols emphasis]

In January, she and Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., nearly derailed GOP leader Kevin McCarthy’s bid to become speaker in a dramatic standoff on the House floor. She accidentally missed the biggest vote of the year — a vote to raise the debt ceiling that she had opposed. Last month, she infuriated GOP leaders and colleagues by trying to force a floor vote on impeaching President Joe Biden over border issues before House investigations into him had wrapped up.

Now, she’s picking a fight over must-pass government funding and military policy bills, demanding they include right-wing policies to win her vote…

…One House GOP lawmaker, who knows Boebert well, offered this advice: “Her ass needs to get home to go campaign. Cut ribbons, go to bar mitzvahs and take credit for stuff she had absolutely nothing to do with.” [Pols emphasis]

[mantra-pullquote align=”right” textalign=”left” width=”60%”]“A lot of Republicans have been bewildered by her. She has not changed her operating style, either substantively or just generally.”

     — Former Colorado GOP Chair Dick Wadhams[/mantra-pullquote]

Boebert’s debt ceiling disaster was the kind of thing that all politicians work hard to avoid. After weeks of high-pitched rhetoric on the debt ceiling debate, Boebert didn’t even bother to cast a vote. She then turned a bad story into a longer (and still bad) story; she kept the news alive for weeks by offering multiple explanations for her absence.

She followed that debacle by angering her own caucus — and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene — with her insistence that House Republicans move forward with a vote to impeach President Biden without even bothering to do the investigation part. Boebert was talked off that particular ledge when her proposal was sent off to die in a committee hearing instead, but the damage was obvious: Multiple House Republicans spoke to media outlets and made it clear that the GOP caucus wasn’t even taking Boebert seriously anymore.

None of this reflects well on Boebert, as NBC News continues:

In a part of Colorado that leans conservative but is accustomed to electing pragmatic Republicans and Democrats who tend to focus on local issues like water, natural resources and agriculture, Boebert stands out in the wrong ways to a segment of voters, Wadhams said.

“The perception, whether it’s fair or not, is that Congresswoman Boebert has paid more attention to fighting these battles within the Republican Party than she has paid attention to the district,” the former Colorado GOP leader said. “Now, I’m sure her office would refute that. The trouble is it gets obscured by how she conducts herself. And that’s what she’s battling right now.” [Pols emphasis]

As for whatever lessons that Boebert once seemed to have learned?

Asked if she planned to change her approach this cycle, Boebert blamed her close call in 2022 on “ballot harvesting” — a GOP term for third-party collection of absentee ballots — rather than what Democrats have called her “MAGA extremism” and political charades.

“We need to get voter turnout. I think that all Republicans need to focus on ballot harvesting where it’s legal in Colorado. And, I mean, that’s something that we have to pay attention to or we’re going to continue to be in the mess that we’re in,” Boebert said in an interview as she descended the Capitol steps. “Democrats chase ballots while we’re chasing voters. And so, I mean, we have to get in the game.”

Those are the words of someone who just doesn’t get it. Boebert spends the majority of her time giving speeches or appearing at fundraisers for fellow MAGA Republicans in places that aren’t anywhere near the third congressional district. This schedule provides some benefit for Boebert, but the returns are diminishing. As Congressman Jason Crow (D-Aurora) told NBC News:

“There are those who can monetize extremism, monetize selfish politics. And she might do that to some degree, but that only carries you so far when you’re literally not submitting funding requests for roads and bridges and water infrastructure. You can only hide that for so long. And clearly last cycle, the jig was up. The jig is even more up now.”

Lauren Boebert was first elected to Congress in 2020 by creating a caricature of a high-heel wearing, gun-holding Trump enthusiast. But like most shticks, this one wore thin; it barely worked again in 2022, and it’s not looking so hot in 2024.

The only Colorado Republican who doesn’t seem to understand this is the only one who really matters.