(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
 . . . . . . . . . .



This Montana Republican wouldn't support McCarthy, but a major group may support him for Senate [1]

['Daily Kos Staff', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags']

Date: 2023-02-08  

Rosendale didn’t get requisite air support to push back, though: While the Senate Leadership Fund spent huge amounts for other Republican Senate candidates, it only went on the air in Montana during the final two weeks of the race. That delay may have made the difference: While other Senate Democrats struggled that year in dark red states, Tester beat Rosendale 50-47.

The Club, however, still very much wanted to see Rosendale in a chamber of Congress. The group, along with its then-ally Donald Trump, supported him in his successful 2020 run for what was at the time Big Sky Country’s only House seat. Rosendale, two years later, claimed the new and safely red 2nd in the eastern part of the state as former Rep. Ryan Zinke returned to D.C. by winning the more competitive 1st, and both men immediately made it clear they could challenge Tester.

But even though Montana had two House members for the first time in three decades, Zinke and Rosendale immediately parted ways on the marathon speakership votes. Zinke, who served a chaotic stint as Trump’s first secretary of the interior, loyally sided with McCarthy on each and every one of the 15 votes, while Rosendale kept supporting alternate candidates. Rosendale explained his disgust with McCarthy by arguing his leader “squandered every opportunity to protect Americans from woke policies,” while Zinke called the spectacle “embarrassing.”

While Zinke avoided directly trashing his homestate colleague, he told Politico, “A lot of the members you see—before they couldn’t buy an interview … And now look at them, some of these members walk around, they got a mob around them and they’re fundraising off it.” Unnamed Republicans also speculated that Rosendale’s obstinacy was all about getting ready for another Senate bid. The 2018 nominee never came around to McCarthy, though he did him a small favor on the very last ballot by voting “present” instead of for an alternate speaker pick.

[END]
---
[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/2/8/2151908/-This-Montana-Republican-wouldn-t-support-McCarthy-but-a-major-group-may-support-him-for-Senate

Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.

via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/