Right Fears ‘Purge’ As GOP Leadership Takes Control

Conservatives fear they’re being pushed aside by Republican leaders as the party looks to regroup from its election losses.

“At the end of the day we lost seats in the House, we lost seats in the Senate, we couldn’t win the presidency, and the response is to purge conservatives,” Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-KS) said Tuesday during a briefing at the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank in Washington.

Huelskamp is one of four Republicans who were stripped of committee seats this week for bucking leadership over the last term. Huelskamp lost his spot on the Budget Committee, where he voted against the House GOP’s budget last year along with Rep. Justin Amash (R-MI), who also was removed this week. David Schweikert (R-AZ) and Walter Jones (R-NC), who also voted against the budget from the right, lost seats on the Financial Services Committee.

“It confirms, in my mind, the deepest suspicions of most Americans about Washington, D.C.,” Huelskamp said. “It’s petty, its vindictive, and if you have any conservative principles you will be punished for articulating those.”

J. Jonah Jameson Laughing