Donald Trump surrounds himself with the most out-of-touch extremists he can find – and is already planning to fill his Cabinet with far-right MAGA fanatics ready to push his dangerous agenda. As Trump floats fellow MAGA loser Kevin McCarthy as chief of staff, DNC Rapid Response Director Alex Floyd released the following statement:

“There’s nobody better than Kevin McCarthy at bending the knee to Donald Trump, pushing his extreme and unpopular MAGA agenda, and then getting humiliated time and time again all the same. McCarthy repeatedly backed Trump’s plans to ban abortion nationwide, threaten our democracy, and rip away affordable health care – and now he’s ready to once again get used by Trump to push the same dangerous platform. If a loser like McCarthy is the best Trump can do for a sidekick, then even Trump knows he’s in deep trouble ahead of November.” 

McCarthy is reportedly a “top candidate” to be chief of staff in Trump’s possible second-term Cabinet because of his “understanding of Capitol Hill”…

Bloomberg: “Ousted US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is seen as a top candidate to serve as chief of staff. McCarthy … has assets that Trump views positively including an understanding of Capitol Hill, federal agencies and budgets.”

… the same Kevin McCarthy who got ousted as speaker of the House by his fellow Republicans after a disastrous speakership.

Reuters: “Kevin McCarthy’s wild ride as US House speaker ends in historic fall”

McCarthy did lasting damage to our democracy by voting to overturn the results of the 2020 election and subsequently embracing Donald Trump after the January 6 insurrection.

Vanity Fair: “Kevin McCarthy cast a vote that should forever define his legacy. Along with 138 of his Republican colleagues in the House, and eight more in the Senate, the then-minority leader voted against certifying the election results on January 6, 2021—even after armed Donald Trump supporters besieged the Capitol to disrupt that very process. It was a shameful act, and one that belied his behind-the-scenes exhortations that the former president put a stop to the chaos and violence. But McCarthy did it anyway—voted against democracy, voted against impeachment, and truckled to Trump at Mar-a-Lago weeks after the Capitol attack—for the same reason he does everything: ambition.”

The Atlantic: “Kevin McCarthy’s Loyalty to Trump Got Him Nothing”

“[McCarthy] quickly moved to mend the breach [after January 6], flying to Mar-a-Lago in late January 2021 to prostrate himself. … Over the next two years, he remained close to Trump, and courted the most hard-core Trump supporters. Faced with the challenge of how to handle Marjorie Taylor Greene, the new representative with a slate of appalling statements and passionate conservative support, McCarthy chose to only lightly castigate and then align with Greene. Those moves were cowardly and often self-debasing.”

Wall Street Journal: “McCarthy Tries to Mend Fences With Trump”

“House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy worked to patch up his relationship with Donald Trump in a meeting in Florida on Thursday, a sign of the former president’s continued sway over the party despite his loss in November and his impeachment this month over the Capitol riot.”

MSNBC Opinion: “What was McCarthy’s previous low point, prior to his ouster? Because there are just so many to choose from.”

“Was it on Jan. 6, 2021, when McCarthy joined 138 other House Republicans voting to try to overturn the 2020 election result, after — I repeat, after — an armed mob of Donald Trump supporters had laid waste to the Capitol?

“Was it on Jan. 28, 2021, when McCarthy made a pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago, Florida, to bend his knee to Trump, and then released a photo of the two of them smiling together, just weeks after he had publicly declared that the former president ‘bears responsibility’ for the attack on Congress?

“Was it on Jan. 7 of this year, when McCarthy finally secured the speaker’s gavel on the 15th House ballot, ‘more rounds of voting than any other time since before the Civil War’?”

McCarthy and Trump want to ban abortion nationwide.

CNN: “McCarthy told CNN he backs legislation to codify a 15-week [national] ban on abortion, saying: ‘I’d support that.’”

McCarthy and Trump both have yearslong records of floating cuts to Social Security and Medicare.

Washington Post: “House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said that if Republicans win control of the House the GOP will use raising the debt limit as leverage to force spending cuts — which could include cuts to Medicare and Social Security.”

McCarthy and Trump support repealing the Affordable Care Act.

Washington Post: “Rep. McCarthy: Repealing Obamacare is ‘easier and faster’ than replacing it”