Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and his allies have said it’s not “a revenge tour.” But it sure seems like it.
Donald Trump ally Rep. Matt Gatz scored an 11th-hour GOP primary opponent. Former naval officer and aviator Aaron Dimmock filed his paperwork on Friday, the deadline, to run against Gaetz in Florida.
Gatz led the charge to remove McCarthy from his post last year. He orchestrated the rare vote on the obscure “motion to vacate.”
Since then, other people who sided with Gaetz have faced similar outside pressure. According to NBC News, “American Prosperity Alliance, a nonprofit advocacy group, has placed nearly $700,000 in ad spending targeting Reps. Nancy Mace of South Carolina, Bob Good of Virginia and Eli Crane of Arizona, according to the ad tracking firm AdImpact. The group also spent more than $90,000 targeting Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur of Ohio, a top general election target for the GOP.”
The group’s senior advisor is GOP strategist Brian O. Walsh, a close ally of McCarthy’s.
Earlier this month, McCarthy took a public crack at Gatz, without calling him out by name, when he told an audience, “I’ll give you the truth why I’m not speaker. It’s because one person, a member of Congress, wanted me to stop an ethics complaint because he slept with a 17-year-old.”
In 2001, the House Ethics Committee announced an investigation Gaetz as federal prosecutors probing sex trafficking allegations against him are also scrutinizing the actions of some of his political allies and fellow Florida Republicans as part of a broader public corruption inquiry.
Gaetz has denied any wrongdoing.
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Matt Arco may be reached at marco@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter at @MatthewArco.
