Retiring Representative Ken Buck has made it clear that he does not care about Lauren Boebert. Any suggestions otherwise are “ridiculous.”
Buck shocked everyone, including his own party leaders, on Tuesday when he announced that he would leave Congress at the end of next week. His decision has further galvanized the search for his successor, temporarily through a special election and permanently in the regular district primary.
Fellow Colorado Republican Boebert is running to take over Buck’s seat in November, but she opted not to run to replace him in the special election in June. She slammed Buck for giving a “gift to the uniparty,” a term far-right Republicans use to describe GOP lawmakers who aren’t extreme enough or who work with Democrats. Boebert also accused Buck of trying to “rig” the primary election.
“It’s ridiculous,” Buck said of Boebert’s allegations in a Thursday night interview with The Colorado Sun.
In fact, Buck said, “I have done my very best to stay out of this primary election.”
“I’m not giving anybody an advantage or disadvantage,” he said, explaining that he chose his retirement date specifically so that the special election could coincide with the primary, thus saving the district money.
Buck also said it was “fundamentally unfair” for Boebert to try to fundraise off her claim that he was taking sides. He noted that he has refused to comment when reporters asked him about the congresswoman’s ex-husband and 18-year-old son, both of whom were arrested recently.
Boebert, who currently represents Colorado’s 3rd district, announced in December that she would move to the 4th and run to succeed Buck. Although the district is a GOP stronghold and will likely send another Republican to Washington, there is no guarantee it will be Boebert, who has struggled to gain traction in a new area and faced accusations of carpetbagging.
Had Boebert decided to run in the special election, that would likely have pushed her out of Congress altogether. In order to run, she would have had to resign her current position and then secure nomination from a vacancy committee. Such committees are usually made up of state party insiders, and many are skeptical of Boebert’s decision to switch districts. It is unlikely she would have been chosen to run.
Buck had announced in November that he would not seek reelection, but he indicated at the time that he would complete his current term. He said his decision to leave earlier was the result of the rapidly devolving situation in the House.
“It is the worst year of the nine years and three months that I’ve been in Congress,” Buck told CNN. “And having talked to former members, it’s the worst year in 40, 50 years to be in Congress.”
“I think this place is dysfunctional.”
Although Buck is a Republican, and even a member of the party’s far-right House Freedom Caucus, he has often been at odds with his fellow Republicans in the past few years. When he first announced his retirement, he slammed the GOP for pushing “self-serving lies,” including that the 2020 election had been stolen.
More recently, Buck has been seemingly the only Republican who refused to fall in line with his party’s efforts to impeach Biden and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. His departure further shrinks the GOP’s razor-thin House majority and will make it even more difficult to get anything done.
