House Speaker Mike Johnson had no idea Representative Ken Buck is quitting, as the GOP is in complete shambles.

Representative Ken Buck took to social media to announce his near-immediate leave from Congress, resigning so fast that even his party leaders were caught off guard by the decision.

“Today, I am announcing that I will depart Congress at the end of next week,” Buck said in a statement on Tuesday. “I look forward to staying involved in our political process, as well as spending more time in Colorado with my family.”

The less-than-two-weeks notice took practically everybody by surprise, including (or maybe especially) House Speaker Mike Johnson.

“I was surprised by Ken’s announcement,” Johnson told a crush of reporters inside the Capitol building. “I look forward to talking to him about that.”

“I didn’t know,” he added.

  • partial_accumen@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    Buck’s reason for leaving seems stupid to me (paraphrasing) “I believe our election system is broken so I want to join a group to fix it”.

    Dude, you’re in the legislature!! Introduce legislation changing it!

  • Coach@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    “It is the worst year of the nine years and three months that I’ve been in Congress,” Buck elaborated to CNN, describing the current iteration of the lower chamber as “dysfunctional” and the “worst year in 40, 50 years.”

    “Instead of having decorum, instead of operating in a professional manner, this place has just devolved into this bickering and nonsense and not really doing the job for the American people.”

    They buried the lead, as do most American media outlets. Who gives a shit about what Mike “Accountability Partner for his” Johnson thinks? The MAGAt party is collapsing. Report on that!

    • Rentlar@lemmy.ca
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      6 months ago

      When I saw Mike Johnson and ‘resignation’ in the same sentence I got a little excited but it was just Ken Buck, which I’d heard reported earlier that didn’t beat around the bush.

    • jordanlund@lemmy.worldM
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      6 months ago

      “The Freedom Caucus member originally announced his intention to retire in November”

      PLUS:

      “It is the worst year of the nine years and three months that I’ve been in Congress,” Buck elaborated to CNN, describing the current iteration of the lower chamber as “dysfunctional” and the “worst year in 40, 50 years.”

      Member of the Leopards Eating Faces Party swears he never thought the leopard would eat his face.

    • Wogi@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      FYI, because I learned this the same way: It’s buried the lede. As in the first sentence of the article.

      • chase_what_matters@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        I’m sorry to be this way, but both are acceptable. Lede has never been formally or universally adopted, and is more a remnant of an industry effort toward low-context clarity due to the word being a homonym. There are countless records of journalists using the traditional spelling when using in the context of writing an article.

        Again, I hate myself for being like this.

        • bitchkat@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          There is absolutely nothing wrong with being pedantic. In my case, it bugs me really bad that people say 110/220 for USA mains voltage. The standard has been 120/240 volts but there is a tolerance on both sides so the older 110/220 are still within specs. But the tolerance is defined from the nominal values of 120/240.

  • themeatbridge@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    I don’t buy it. Ken “Dipshit” Buck is one of the reasons Congress is dysfunctional. And he already announced that he wasn’t running for reelection. He could literally phone it in for the next 9 months, and holding a special election doesn’t do him or his party any good.

    Maybe they used kompromat to get him to do something he didn’t want to do, and he thinks they won’t expose him if he resigns? It will be interesting if Boebert resigns to try to win the special election, because then her district will have to hold a special election, too.

  • glovecraft@infosec.pub
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    6 months ago

    This is the seat Lauren Boebert is trying to carpetbag her way into.

    Boebert could also run to replace Buck in the now-necessary special election, but that would complicate her career even further. Colorado Sun reporter Jesse Paul pointed out that Boebert would likely have to resign her current position in order to be chosen as the GOP special election nominee. If she does and then loses, she would be out of Congress.

    Hilarious. Isn’t her polling doing pretty badly? More likely she won’t be chosen and will either have to defend her current seat, and risk losing, or just quit for the grifter lifestyle.