Madison Cawthorn: Rogue Republican

By DON ROLLINS

Spring has sprung here in North Carolina’s scenic 11th District. The mountains are greening, the flat-landers have come to take selfies on Jump Off Rock, and Madison Cawthorn signs adorn damn near every empty strip of grass from Burnsville to Murphy.

For the past year-and-a-half Cawthorn has served as US. representative to the 11th, giving us constituents front row seats to what happens when you combine a circus with a train wreck: funny and scary, entertaining and horrifying. And not a little embarrassing for Republican kingmakers hankering for young, brash, moldable stock.

To be sure Cawthorn’s public vitriol and abandon are earning him rogue status in a lockstep Republican culture (and no doubt multiple trips to Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s woodshed). Still Cawthorn has enjoyed overall party support in denying his role in the the Jan. 6 invasion, and only mild noogies for disparaging the Ukrainian cause.

But in light of Cawthorn’s by now infamous accusations of coke-fueled orgies arranged by senior Republican pols, his roguish ways may finally be catching up with him.

Until recently, Cawthorn could assume party backing for a second term, based in part on a strong 2020 performance (Cawthorn easily won the GOP primary and the general election by double digits) and potential stardom. But that assumption may no longer hold given six and counting fellow Republicans have filed to oppose him in November, one already receiving hefty state GOP contributions.

Cawthorn’s support is also softening here in the 11th District, but for a more localized reason. Until earlier this year, Cawthorn’s strategy for 2022 included running in another, even redder North Carolina district. But his plan for taking up residence in the 13th District was abandoned after the US Supreme Court let stand a state court ruling to reverse Republican gerrymandering. Once the decision was announced, Cawthorn wasted no time in offering a spectacularly transparent explanation for “staying home” as he continues his public service, then promptly refiled in the 11th. But the move and un-move are not lost on some of the locals, not all of them progressives.

Rogue Republican is not a phrase commonly heard these days. Even when used, it most often refers to the handful of state and federal GOP politicians that dare govern from conscience, not convenience. But until and unless we here in the 11th decide otherwise, Madison Cawthorn will have two more years to redefine what it means to be a rogue Republican. And we’ll be back to watching a circus and a trainwreck.

Don Rollins is a Unitarian Universalist minister living in Hendersonville, N.C. Email donaldlrollins@gmail.com.

From The Progressive Populist, May 1, 2022

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