Here’s thing about this John Boehner – Jeff Flake – Joe Biden storyline
On Sunday night John Kasich announced that a “prominent” Republican member of Congress was set to endorse Joe Biden on Monday. This set off all kinds of speculation across social media about who it might be. Kasich then clarified that it was a former member of Congress, setting off a second round of speculation.
To be clear, no one has any idea who the person is. But so many observers on Twitter guessed that it might be John Boehner or Jeff Flake, their names both started trending on Sunday night. This in turn set off a widespread debate about whether we even want the likes of Kasich, Boehner, and Flake endorsing Biden. After all, they all suck.
I’ll make it easy for you: of course we want their endorsement. Yes, they suck – but that’s not relevant. They can get us some moderate votes. Maybe a lot, maybe just a few, we have no way of knowing. But there’s no scenario where this somehow costs us votes. So of course we want it. This is too important of an election to be puritans about it. This is about winning.
It’s not as if Joe Biden is caving to the likes of Boehner or Kasich on policy by accepting their endorsements. In reality, any Republicans who endorse Biden will be the ones caving on policy, because they’ll be choosing to accept the Democratic Party’s political positions just to get Donald Trump out of office. So if you’re thinking about pitching a fit because you don’t like the Republicans who are getting behind Biden, please find something more constructive to be outraged about. Again, this is about winning.
