Madison Cawthorn Keeps Getting Worse – By Jim Newell (Slate) / Aug 31 2021
There was a brief moment in North Carolina Rep. Madison Cawthorn’s nascent legislative career when he seemed as though he might begin behaving, against all expectations, like an adult member of Congress.
Cawthorn, along with many of his House Republican colleagues, had stoked the “stolen election” narrative before its crescendo at the Capitol on Jan. 6. The then–25-year-old had urged Trump supporters in December to “lightly threaten” their members of Congress “and say, you know what, if you don’t start supporting election integrity, I’m coming after you, Madison Cawthorn is coming after you, everybody’s coming after you.” He also spoke at the Jan. 6 “Stop the Steal” rally, revving up the crowd against the Democrats and Republicans who were“hiding” and “trying to silence your voice.” But then, like other Republican members literally hiding in the Capitol a few hours later, Cawthorn fired off a tweet to his supporters telling them to stand down.
Despite twice voting to object to state Electoral College counts once the Capitol had been cleared, Cawthorn did seem to recognize that he and his party had gone too far, and said on Jan. 24 that “the election was not fraudulent” and that Joe Biden “is our president.” He signed an Inauguration Day letter, along with 16 other House Republican freshmen, pledging to work with Biden. He even went further than many of his colleagues in applying to Trump some of the blame for the “sickening and infuriating” Jan. 6 incident, which “slid back our movement years and years.”
