The GOP Civil War Hit Idaho Again On Tuesday— MAGAt Ousts Senate President Chuck Winder

Fascists vs Conservatives

Far right loon Josh Keyser beat very conservative Chuck Winder

Idaho is a Republican hellhole. With the exception of the LBJ landslide of 1964, the last time the state voted for a Democratic presidential candidate was the narrow 1948 Harry Truman win (49.98%). In 2020, Idaho gave Trump 63.84% of its votes, worse than any states other than the Dakotas, West Virginia and Wyoming. He won 41 of the state’s 44 counties. Every federal elected official and every statewide elected official is a Republican and in the state legislature, Democrats are an afterthought— 7 out of 35 in the state Senate and 11 out of 70 in the state House. Idaho’s not exactly a vibrant robustly functioning democracy. So I didn’t bother to report some real Idaho news in yesterday’s election wrap-up.

But in a party driven insane and off-the-rails by Trump’s increasingly open fascist perspective, a full-blown GOP civil war was always inevitable, with the MAGAts fighting for dominance over the establishment country club conservatives. And, predictably, the MAGAts are winning and taking over state parties one by one— and generally running them into the ground. Last night a MAGAt came out the winner against the top Republican in the Idaho state Senate:

• Josh Keyser- 52.3%

• Chuck Winder- 47.7%

And this was in Boise, no less! Ian Stevenson reported for the Statesman that “The night’s consequences tested the competing platforms within the state GOP before the will of voters, who are making choices about the direction the party takes. Winder’s loss to a more conservative candidate marked one of several wins for the far-right, including former Sen. Christy Zito, of Hammett, defeating more moderate Sen. Geoff Schroeder (R-Mountain Home) for his seat. Rep. Megan Blanksma (R-Hammett), who was ousted as House majority leader earlier this year, lost her seat after voters backed her challenger, Faye Thompson. In Canyon County, hard-line conservatives scored major victories: Rep. Julie Yamamoto (R-Caldwell), a more traditional Republican who chaired the House Education Committee, lost to challenger Kent Marmon, who was endorsed by the far-right Idaho Freedom political action committee. Incumbent Rep. Kenny Wroten (R-Nampa) lost his House seat to the more conservative Steve Tanner. And far-right incumbents in the county fended off challengers, too: Sen. Brian Lenney (R-Nampa), a member of the Idaho Freedom Caucus, defeated former Sen. Jeff Agenbroad for the second time in two years, while Sen. Tammy Nichols (R-Middleton) handily defeated a more moderate conservative, Lori Bishop… The Idaho Senate took a rightward turn after the 2022 primary elections, when numerous far-right candidates beat out more establishment candidates for their party’s nomination. Dozens of seats in the Legislature were filled with new lawmakers, including nearly half of the Senate… But more establishment candidates also defeated some of the most conservative lawmakers. North Idaho voters backed former Sen. Jim Woodward over far-right incumbent Sen. Scott Herndon (R-Sagle), in one of the most expensive races of the cycle that drew nearly $164,000 in donations. Rep. Jacyn Gallagher (R-Weiser), who advanced legislation weakening public health laws, also lost her seat to John Shirts, a candidate more aligned with Idaho’s establishment Republicans.”

Laura Guido, reporting for the Idaho Press, wrote that the result “Keyser said on his campaign website that he was a vice principal at a private Christian school in the Treasure Valley. He had been a Boise Police Department trainee, who in 2019 filed a tort claim against the city alleging that he was told to resign or be fired.” Keyser was from an LAPD racist family from the San Fernando Valley. He ethnically cleansed himself out of L.A. and moved to Idaho, like so many Southern California fascist types have. He'll face Democrat Andy Arriaga in November in a race that wasn’t expected to be competitive (against Winder) but could possibly be now that Arriaga is facing an extremist nut.

There are no states this disease will skip over. We have seen more and more conservative Republicans leaving their party— claiming the party left them— and finding a new home in a very corporate-friendly Democratic Party, where progressives are being decimated by big GOP bucks laundered through outfits like AIPAC, 314 Action and the crypto-Super PACs. Conservative "ex"-Republicans are running for Congress against real Democrats. I wrote about a good example in Arizona earlier in the week, where prominent Republican Marlene Woods has a real chance of being elected to Congress as a conservative Democrat.