The House holdouts that prolonged the vote over Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) as Speaker of the House ended up getting some massive agreements on new House rules.
One of the casualties of the intense negotiations seems to be Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX). Some believe that there were things revealed about him that were not good; he called other GOP colleagues some nasty names, including the label of “terrorists.” And he said that they were “enemies” for upholding what they believed was their obligation to their constituents and the American people.
Crenshaw may be feeling some major regret as he is now trying to clean up the mess that was made and “apologizing.” He appeared on CNN, not Fox, so that may not have the needed effect on the base who is unhappy with him. They certainly are not watching CNN.
Crenshaw may have tried to apologize, but what he did was act like he hadn’t said much that was wrong and he made it sound like people were just being overly sensitive.
“Look, things get heated and things get said. Obviously, to people who took offense by that, it’s pretty obvious that it’s meant as a turn of phrase,” Crenshaw said to CNN’s Jake Tapper.
He then acted like he really couldn’t understand how it could have offended people and he admitted that he was a “little taken aback” by the “sensitivity.”
“To the extent that I have colleagues that were offended by it, I sincerely apologize to them. I don’t want them to think I actually believe they’re terrorists. It’s clearly a turn of phrase that you use in what is an intransigent negotiation,” Crenshaw said.
Somebody should have prepped Crenshaw and helped him realize that when you apologize, you don’t work to justify the reason that you said what you said, and you don’t go after the people you are apologizing to.
And really, using the words “terrorist” and “enemy” doesn’t seem like just a “turn of phrase,”, especially in today’s world.
It’s probably too little too late for Crenshaw.
