O.K., enough pity party for Dusty.
South Dakota’s Republican primary voters freed Congressman Dusty Johnson of having to kiss Donald Trump’s ass Tuesday when they gave him a humiliating third place in the gubernatorial primary. Trump can’t hurt Dusty now. Dusty doesn’t have to fight a Republican runoff and pander for King Don’s endorsement. He doesn’t have to work to beat back the texts and TV ads that his Republican opponents deployed claiming ridiculously Dusty doesn’t back Trump enough and is a liberal Democrat in disguise. Dusty can just go back to Washington and spend the last seven months of his term voting for the policies that he knows are right. And if voting for good policies isn’t enough motivation, Dusty could cast a few votes against Trump’s priorities to blow raspberries at King Don—Take that, you fat fartface! I back your bullshit 99% of the time and you don’t lift a finger to help me win one little Governor’s race? Thanks for nothing!
But Congressman keeps putting blind loyalty to the naked emperor over good policy. On key votes this week where a few House Republicans showed some spine, Dusty showed dumb cowardice… or maybe just laziness.
On Wednesday, the House voted 215–208 to invoke the War Powers Act and end the President’s unprovoked military assault on Iran. Congressman Johnson said last week “we absolutely do need a resolution” on the Iran war, but he didn’t rush back to Washington after his primary defeat to make sure we got one. A little hustle could have made up for Dusty’s vote against last month’s resolution to stop Trump’s war; Johnson’s May nay caused that resolution to fail on a 212–212 vote.
Dusty slept in Thursday, too. He skipped the vote to renew military aid for Ukraine. 18 Republicans voted to help beat back Putin’s aggression. Dusty couldn’t even bring himself to sign the discharge petition that circulated since last July and that Democrats, two Republicans, and one independent used to smoke out the Ukraine aid bill and bring it to the floor over Speaker Mike Johnson’s objection. Dusty used to think supporting Ukraine against Russian bullies was really important, but he’s wienied out on Zelenskyy since Trump came back to Washington.
America would achieve a lot more for its security (and for cheaper gas prices) if it stopped shooting at Iran and trained equivalent firepower on Russian forces in Ukraine. Maybe we’ll see Dusty wise up when he gets back to Washington. But for now, it appears he can’t even get out of bed to stand up against the tyrant who cost him his chance to to be Governor.