Gaetz Launches Campaign To Unseat Fellow GOP Rep

Politico reports:

Matt Gaetz led the GOP push that ejected Kevin McCarthy from the speakership. Now he’s turning to his next target: Booting another fellow Republican from the House entirely.

The Florida Republican is slated to headline a campaign rally next week with Darren Bailey, the GOP primary rival of Rep. Mike Bost (R-Ill.), chair of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee. Bost is a longtime foe of Gaetz’s inside the GOP conference, but the rally amounts to an escalation of their mutual disdain.

The bad blood between Gaetz and Bost is well-known in the House, spilling into view during a House GOP meeting last year where Bost exploded in rage at Gaetz for trying to address colleagues after engineering McCarthy’s firing.

Read the full article. Politico notes that the above-cited clash nearly turned into a fistfight. Bailey first appeared here in 2022 during his failed bid to unseat Gov. J.B. Pritzker when he declared that abortion is worse than the Holocaust. Bost is a freshman and former Illinois state rep.

Matt Gaetz led the GOP push to eject Kevin McCarthy from the speakership. Now he’s turning to his next target: fellow Republican Rep. Mike Bost.

Asked if he considered Gaetz a threat, Bost said: “I considered him an ass, but never a threat.”https://t.co/QMVaAonSFN

— POLITICO (@politico) February 7, 2024