{"id":28580,"date":"2024-03-23T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-03-23T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/rep-ken-buck-will-miss-the-people-but-not-the-dysfunction\/"},"modified":"2024-03-23T14:00:00","modified_gmt":"2024-03-23T14:00:00","slug":"rep-ken-buck-will-miss-the-people-but-not-the-dysfunction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/rep-ken-buck-will-miss-the-people-but-not-the-dysfunction\/","title":{"rendered":"Rep. Ken Buck will miss the people, but not the dysfunction"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Colorado
Colorado Republican U.S. Rep. Ken Buck speaks with KNUS radio talk show host Steffan Tubbs at the Western Conservative Summit on Friday, June 3, 2022.<\/span>Hart Van Denburg\/CPR News<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

That Rep. Ken Buck\u2019s last day in Congress was spent dealing with a government spending bill is more than a little apropos.<\/p>\n

The Windsor Republican came into office as part of the 2014 Tea Party wave, railing against government spending and the growing national debt. And during his almost 10 years in office, he was a consistent vote against government funding bills and short-term spending measures known as CRs, irrespective of which party held power.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that this place is broken when it comes to spending. There is an absolute lack of responsibility and awareness that we are going to go off a cliff if we continue to spend this way,\u201d Buck told CPR News Thursday.<\/p>\n

His office is now bare. The photos and the stars-and-stripes-emblazoned AR-15 that once hung on his walls are all down. A couple of bubble wrapped memotoes sat on his desk, ready to go.<\/p>\n

Buck announced in November that he was not going to run for reelection, but he surprised many in the political world by deciding to leave before his term was up.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s funny that people ask me, \u2018Why are you leaving so early in your career?\u2019 I\u2019m leaving (because) it\u2019s time to leave,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He has been vocal about all the ways the House has been dysfunctional.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve taken impeachment and we\u2019ve made it a social media issue as opposed to a constitutional concept. This place just keeps going downhill and I don\u2019t need to spend my time here,\u201d he said after announcing that March 22 would be his last day on the job.<\/p>\n

And like many people who are hitting the exits, Buck has pointed out all the way Congress does not work.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is a series of what, I think, are dysfunctions in this institution that I am tired of. And we just covered one \u2013 spending \u2013 and there are certainly others, but the place doesn’t work on behalf of the American people,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

Buck\u2019s departure also comes after a year in which he repeatedly, and publicly, broke with the majority his caucus. Not just on its efforts to impeach President Joe Biden, but also in his ongoing defense of the integrity of the 2020 election and his role in last fall\u2019s Speaker fights.<\/p>\n

For some of his Republican colleagues, his decision to leave early and winnow further the already razor-thin Republican House majority is a final thumb in the eye. Rep. Lauren Boebert, who moved across the state to run to replace Buck, said his early exit \u201cwas a gift to the Uniparty. The establishment concocted a swampy backroom deal to try to rig an election.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Buck said a big part of his timing stems from what he wants to do next: Get better candidates to run for office up and down the ballot \u2013 starting this election cycle.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to make sure that the right people are attracted to run \u2026 And then also there are policies out there that need to change and we need to make sure we’re promoting those. So process, people and policy, and that’s what I’m going to be looking at in the next few months,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The other part stems from his fiscal conservative roots. He wanted his early exit to cost taxpayers as little as possible. Holding a special election on the day of the primary is cheaper than holding it at a later date. However, the additional election, which will likely require separate ballots, could still end up costing counties tens of thousands of dollars.<\/p>\n

In recent years, Republican critics have blasted Buck, once described by his political opponents as \u201ctoo conservative for Colorado,\u201d as a RINO. Earlier this week, the House Freedom Caucus, which he\u2019s belonged to since its start, voted to kick him out, days before he was due to leave.<\/p>\n

But Buck, who describes himself as a constitutional conservative, points to his conservative voting score cards, where he usually ranks in the 90s.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I won’t do is violate the Constitution and vote for impeachments that are not appropriate. What I won’t do is promote a narrative about how the 2020 election was stolen when it wasn’t stolen. I won’t talk about how people who assaulted police officers and destroyed federal government property should not be prosecuted,\u201d Buck explained. \u201cSome of the people in the Freedom Caucus have an issue with me because I will not promote false narratives.\u201d<\/p>\n

If Buck has regrets about his years in Congress, they\u2019re not about his voting record or that he was willing to speak out, even against his own party. It\u2019s the time he\u2019s lost with his kids and grandkids. \u201cI miss my family. I miss a lot of the regular grandkid birthdays and a lot of things like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

He might not have gotten everything he wanted done, but he\u2019s proud of his work, especially when it comes to his efforts trying to rein in Big Tech. In the past few years he worked on bills tackling anti-competitive practices in the digital marketplace and targeting TikTok.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn’t get every antitrust bill passed, but we raised the issue and made it part of the discussion in this place and in America,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The conservative also managed to work across the aisle on some issues.<\/p>\n

Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal, head of the Progressive Caucus, disagrees with Buck on a lot of policy issues, but they were able to find some common ground when it came to topics like Big Tech regulation or banning Congress members from stock trading. She partnered with him on a digital advertising antitrust bill and described him as a \u201cgood partner.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think he\u2019s just a man of integrity and he\u2019s been a really good friend and colleague,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Buck said there is common ground on issues in Congress \u2013 sometimes members might only find 2% that they can agree on, but there\u2019s always something there.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe found that 2%, and I’m really happy. And I did the same thing with other Republicans that are from more urban districts and we found common ground,\u201d he said. \u201cI won’t compromise my core values, but I absolutely will compromise to get a half a loaf of bread and be able to work with that.\u201d<\/p>\n

But he also noted it\u2019s becoming harder to do so, and it\u2019s part of the reason he\u2019s leaving early.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can’t tell you how many people came up to me after the vote on the (Homeland Security Secretary) Mayorkas impeachment \u2013 Republicans \u2013 and said, \u2018you did the right thing,\u2019 but they were unwilling to do the right thing because they knew there would be a penalty come primary season back home.\u201d he recalled, saying Democrats did the same, with some admitting privately the Trump impeachments were wrong. \u201cSo people recognize right from wrong here. They just won’t act on it because there are political consequences.\u201d<\/p>\n

Buck does have one piece of advice for whoever replaces him: be true to yourself.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe allure of power is something that people have to address early on. If that’s what they’re after, great. They’re going to be voting the way somebody else tells ’em to vote and they’re not going to be voting their conscience. And if you vote your conscience because you’re true to yourself, I think you can always sleep well at night,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Buck plans to leave with his head held high, missing the people \u2013 although maybe not all of them \u2013 and not the process.<\/p>\n

And he plans to vote \u201cNo\u201d on that one last government spending bill.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Colorado Republican U.S. Rep. Ken Buck speaks with KNUS radio talk show host Steffan Tubbs at the Western Conservative Summit on Friday, June 3, 2022.Hart Van Denburg\/CPR News That Rep. Ken Buck\u2019s last day in Congress was spent dealing with a government spending bill is more than a little apropos. The Windsor Republican came into […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28581,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[120,266,28,265],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-28580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-colorado","tag-election","tag-headlines","tag-politics"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28580"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28580\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28581"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28580"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=28580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}