GOP looks to marginalize Cawthorn if he wins Tuesday primary

“My hope is that North Carolina-11 will deal with it.”

cnn.com
GOP looks to marginalize Cawthorn if he wins Tuesday primary
Republicans are publicly and privately rooting for Rep. Madison Cawthorn to lose his North Carolina primary race on Tuesday. But

GOP looks to marginalize Cawthorn if he wins Tuesday primary

By Melanie Zanona, Manu Raju and Alex Rogers, CNN
Updated 4:04 PM EDT, Fri May 13, 2022

(CNN) — Republicans are publicly and privately rooting for Rep. Madison Cawthorn to lose his North Carolina primary race on Tuesday. But they’re also preparing for an alternate scenario: how to deal with the embattled freshman if he returns to Congress after becoming a party pariah. ... In private discussions, GOP lawmakers are debating ways to keep Cawthorn on the sidelines should he prevail in his North Carolina reelection race, from relegating him to less favorable committees to warning the punishments could get even stiffer should his controversial antics continue, according to interviews with more than a dozen lawmakers from across the House Republican conference.

One GOP lawmaker affiliated with the Trump wing of the party told CNN they bluntly warned Cawthorn that they would publicly call for him to be removed from the House GOP conference if he breaks the law again, furious that Cawthorn was cited twice for bringing a gun to the airport and was caught driving with a revoked license for the second time in 5 years in North Carolina. ... “I met with the guy and said, ‘Don’t break the law again. You break the law one more time, I’m going to start calling for you to be kicked out,’” the lawmaker said. “And I don’t mean kicked out of (the House Freedom) Caucus, I mean kicked out of Conference. Voting him out. He’s a black eye on our conference.”

That idea of ousting Cawthorn from conference has not been discussed by Republican leadership and doesn’t appear to have wide traction inside the GOP but has been kicked around by some rank-and-file members, the lawmaker said, demonstrating the level of frustration with Cawthorn inside the House GOP.

Through a spokesman, Cawthorn declined to comment to CNN for this story.

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