To put it simply, modern politics is to polarized that it’s unthinkable for a party to investigate its own President anymore. Chaffetz always had a reputation for honesty and reaching out to the other side. Rather than stay in the Fox bubble, he made a point of giving access to less safe media outfits.
But now he’s head of the Oversight Committee with a Republican President in office, and Chaffetz has an extremely target rich environment for investigation. And he’s doing, well, nothing. He doesn’t think he can investigate the Trump administration and he can’t stay in office and NOT investigate the Trump administration. He doesn’t want to be one of THOSE Republicans, so he’s quitting. The fact that he’s quitting Oversight right away is further evidence that the Oversight Committee itself is a big part of the problem for him.
So, given the reality of partisan politics in the current environment, I have a reform proposal: Majority control and chairmanship of Oversight should always go to the party not in the White House. Congress SHOULD aggressively hound administrations. Better yet, I don’t think it should even be majority, the committee should just be all members of the party out of the White House. I don’t need to see those supposedly overseeing the government to be acting as defense lawyers for it. That’s not their job, yet that’s how Democrats behaved during the Obama years, especially Elijah Cummings. Then he turns around and wants Trump investigated vigorously while Chaffetz would rather investigate the Kardashians or whatever it is his committee has been looking into that I can’t be bothered to remember. So fine: Make Cummings the chairman and staff it with all Democrats, preferably the ones most vociferously opposed to the Trump administration. Then next time a Democrat is in office, put the most angry Republican in charge and let him invite his angry friends to join him.
What makes you think oversight is a partisan function, and not one of fact-finding and judgment against objective standards? The Watergate committee might not agree.
You’re also engaging in both-sides-ism, assuming that Obama’s sins are equivalent to Trump’s and should be handled equivalently. The facts are not consistent with that basic assumption.
But your suggestion that Chaffetz is resigning because he cannot put country above party is spot on. There’s also a job opening at Fox.
Yeah, I agree that Chaffetz is likely quitting because he doesn’t want to investigate the president. I read an opinion piece that suggested he might run for governor of Utah and doesn’t want the stink of Trump on him and wants to appear neutral to the Trump supporters
I think the most likely reason is that C knows a lot more about the corruption that is Thrump than he can live with. If he thought the investigation would not tear his party apart, he’d stay and steer it through a rough patch to safe harbor. Not seeing a way to do that, he decided to get back to Utah before the storm hit.
And it’s now becoming less and less likely that there will be a bunch of major legislative accomplishments to offset the Trump stink. However terrible Trump is, he was at least supposed to be signing all the conservatives’ fantasy legislation into law starting on day one.
Well, adaher, that might justify his handing off the Oversight Committee to someone else. But it certainly has little to do with the persistent rumors that he will resign from Congress soon. If he gives up the seat in Congress anytime soon, one will have to think that it is either because of some unknown scandal that has yet to surface, or because he’s frustrated that the President isn’t going to give him what he wants on things like Utah’s public lands, and doesn’t want to butt heads with someone from his own Party on the subject. Given that Congresscritters rarely step down early for anything other than promotion (not the case here) or demotion (scandal or family pressure), one does have to wonder.
Kinda sad (!) that there are so many people who, having only the depth of historical understanding of an O’Reilly, really do think the purpose of Congressional investigatory committees is simple partisan harassment. Much sadder still that their numbers include so many actual members of Congress. But not as sad as that acting in the national interest is so commonly seen as a vote-killer that must be avoided.
Maybe Chaffetz just had a long dark tea-time of the soul and figured it out, but realized he lacks the character to rise above it and could only quit. As Sartre observed, “Hell is truth seen too late”, right, Jason?
Here’s an article from the Deseret News. Utah paper.
Chaffetzs came under heat in a few different ways in Utah following Trump: the Town Halls and his failure to investigate Trump. In Utah they believed that he would investigate Trump, that he was non-partisan. They had seen him lead the charge against Hillary and they wanted him to clean house on Trump. Chaffetzs was under party pressure not to do that.
He was faced with the reality of actually having to campaign and fundraise against other candidates. He reportedly does not like that part of the job.
He goofed up badly on healthcare (he was mister “iPhone” versus healthcare).
Apparently there are also persistent rumors of a gig at Fox to keep him on the media until it’s time to run for governor.
Basically - it’s not fun anymore, his constituency is angry and it’s time to get out while he can salvage something (or he could do his job, which people in Utah might admire, but that’s not the math he’s following).
Trouble with pols infected with terminal ambition is they look to see which way the crowd is moving, then run to the front and pretend they are leading.
Rep. Chaffetz said he was considering stepping down at some unidentified point in the rest of his term. Teh Rumorz had him stepping down before the end of this last week, potentially (showing again just how valuable rumors are at predicting things).
I think he wants to run in 2020, however Trump is still extremely popular among republicans, polling at 80% approval. However I don’t think mormons are as strongly Trump as other republican or republican leaning religious groups. I’m not sure what role that played in everything.
Oversight should be and once was non-partisan. Since the Clinton years, it’s become partisan, and sure, that’s the Republicans’ fault. They did it first.
Obama’s sins are not equivalent to Trump’s. Where the “both sides do it” criticism is accurate is that where Obama did sin, Elijah Cummings acted as defense lawyer for the administration rather than performing his proper role.
If we’re grading on a curve, having enough shame to retire speaks highly of him, although not as highly as if he’d actually done his job.
I think there are several silly things in this post.
First of all, since when doe Chaffetz have a reputation for bipartisanship? He has always seemed to me to be nothing more than a Republican party hack. With him its OMG! Benghazi! OMG! Emails! Treason and corruption on the part of the Cheeto Bandito? Nothing to see here, walk along and don’t look.
Correction: it is unthinkable for Republicans to investigate a Republican president anymore.
Precisely what “scandal” did Cummings act like Obama’s defense lawyer for? Governing While Black? Show me one instance where Democrats blocked or hindered investigation of Democratic presidents. Show me one thing that Obama should have been investigated for.
Back to Chaffetz. There is something there, we just don’t know what it is. It could be he knows of something major that is going to come out leading to the imprisonment of our Commander In Thief. If I had to guess, it’s a personal scandal about Chaffetz that is going to break. Whatever it is, he wants to be out of office when it breaks so he gets to choose the time when he packs his bags.
Pretty much all the investigations against Obama, from Benghazi to Fast and Furious, to the IRS, saw Cummings completely uninterested in finding anything out and urging Republicans to stop.