I had the pleasure of meeting recently with my new congressman, Van Taylor, a Plano Republican.
I found him to be an earnest young man, a serious legislator, someone keenly interested in building bipartisan relationships with his Democratic colleagues.
That makes it all the more disappointing to know that the freshman lawmaker choked on a resolution condemning Donald Trump for his racist-sounding tweets involving four Democratic congresswomen, all people of color, all U.S. citizens … and all of whom Trump said should go back to their country of origin. Oh, wait! Three of them were born in the United States!
Taylor didn’t join the four Republican House members who decided to put country ahead of the president and his party. I just wish Rep. Taylor had acted more decisively on the danger being posed by a president who says the things he does about House members who disagree with him politically.
Trump’s Twitter tirade against Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ayanna Pressley, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar were clearly in my view dripping with racist intent. The House was correct to condemn the president for issuing them.
I just wanted there to be more of a bipartisan voice in that chorus of condemnation. I especially expected better of my congressman.
Same story with my freshman congressman – Dan Crenshaw of Texas District 2. I don’t know him personally, but from what I do know, I doubt he condones President Trump’s racial tweets. Yet he apparently feels he can’t vote to condemn them. He has to put party above country which is disappointing. This is a prime example of the problem with partisan politics identified by Rep. Justin Amash earlier this month.