GOP lawmaker: No cash for campaign arm because it backs gays [View all]

[KamaAina]

http://www.politico.com/story/2015/07/gop-garrett-hensarling-no-cash-for-campaign-arm-because-it-backs-gays-120201.html

Closed committee meetings are typically wonkish, routine affairs. But Friday’s session of Republicans on the House Financial Services Committee broke that pattern in spectacular fashion, laying bare the growing acrimony and sense of disorder within the House Republican Conference.

It started, according to multiple sources present, when Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) told members that subcommittee chairmen are expected to pay their dues to the GOP’s campaign arm and to side with leaders on procedural votes that are critical to their ability to control the party’s legislative agenda.

Hensarling was complying with recent demands for such loyalty from Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.). But his message seemed squarely aimed at one lawmaker: New Jersey Rep. Scott Garrett. A Hensarling ally who chairs a prized Financial Services subcommittee, Garrett has angered GOP leaders and many members of the committee. He voted against Boehner’s bid for another term as speaker, bucked leadership on a critical procedural vote and has refused to pay National Republican Congressional Committee dues.

Garrett first responded that his procedural vote against leadership was a matter of conscience. Then he stunned the room with this explanation: He had not supported the NRCC in the past, he said, because it actively recruited gay candidates and supported homosexuals in primaries.