James Antle explains in a Daily Caller column that congressional conservatives are voting with their feet when it comes to membership in a caucus devoted to conservative issues.
The Beatles broke up. So, eventually, did Led Zeppelin. The biggest conservative caucus in Congress appears to be next.
House conservatives are planning what National Journal described as a “mass exodus” from the Republican Study Committee. The departing lawmakers complain that the RSC has stopped fighting for its founding principles– much like the Republican Party itself.
Unlike the Beatles, the RSC isn’t going away. But dissatisfied conservatives are going to start a splinter group of their own.
Membership in the RSC has exploded from 7 percent of the House Republican Conference to more than 70 percent. As late as 2000, the group had just 40 members. After the 2010 elections, it received over 60 new members from the GOP freshman class alone.
But all that growth didn’t make the RSC more conservative, dissidents complained. In fact, some questioned how a group that included a majority of Republican legislators could really be an effective conservative caucus inside the House. The founding members had always worried that if they loosened their grip, leadership would infiltrate.
After Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan stepped down as chairman, disenchanted members complained that the RSC became too conciliatory toward leadership. Several conservative Capitol Hill aides told The Daily Caller its agenda was diluted and indistinguishable from the GOP conference as a whole. Longtime Executive Director Paul Teller was let go for working with outside conservative groups against a two-year budget deal many on the right — but not as many RSC members — opposed.
