Rep. Ken Buck (R-CO) took some shots at the GOP leadership on his way out the door after announcing he wouldn’t finish his term in Congress. Saying his last day representing Colorado’s 4th district — its “reddest” according to voter demographics — would be next week, Buck asserted that the House of Representatives had gone “downhill” and that he didn’t “need to spend my time here.”
Specifically, Buck says the GOP-led House is so unserious that they have taken a grave matter like impeachment and turned it into a “social media issue” instead of a “constitutional concept.”
GOP Rep. Ken Buck: “This place just keeps going downhill…Mike Johnson’s ability to talk me into staying here, is going to be as successful as his ability of talking to me into unconstitutional impeachments.” pic.twitter.com/8T4g8fV8il
— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) March 12, 2024
Buck called out House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) by name, indicating he would resist any effort by Johnson to get him to stay in a House where the GOP majority is thin. “Mike Johnson’s ability,” Buck said, “to talk me into staying here is going to be about as successful as talking me into unconstitutional impeachments.”
[Related: Ken Buck Presidential Run “Possibility” Says U.S. Congresswoman]
Buck has repeatedly said Republican Oversight and Judiciary Committee Chairs James Comer (R-KY) and Jim Jordan (R-OH) haven’t produced evidence of impeachable offenses by President Biden, despite long exhaustive investigations that continue. Buck also voted against his party when it impeached DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
Buck’s hurry to depart forces a special election to elect a lawmaker to fill his seat for the rest of the year, perhaps another provocation to the MAGA adherents in the GOP.
The district-switching Congresswoman Lauren Boebert, who will ditch the 3rd district to compete in the GOP primary for the 4th district to try to replace Buck’s replacement, has characterized Buck’s early departure as a “uni-party” attempt to hinder her political career.