In a pre-election interview, Representative Glenn Grothman laid out what he sees as the stakes of tomorrow’s midterms.
In a pre-election interview, Representative Glenn Grothman laid out what he sees as the stakes of tomorrow’s midterms.
P resident Biden argued in the run-up to Tuesday’s midterm elections that “democracy is on the ballot.” But in the view of Representative Glenn Grothman (R., Wis.), one of a number of GOP congressmen poised to assume a key oversight role should his party win control of the House on Election Day, the nation’s character is what’s actually on the line.
In an interview with National Review, the Wisconsin Republican claimed that the Democrats want to “remake America” and painted a dire picture of what will happen if Republicans fail to retake at least one chamber of Congress. “They want to fundamentally change the United States into a place where parents are powerless, the government is ginormous, the border is open, and corruption runs wild,” Grothman said. “That’s not who we are.”
The polls overwhelmingly suggest that Grothman’s fears are likely to prove unfounded; at a minimum, Republicans look almost certain to reclaim control of the House on Tuesday. Grothman, whose own reelection race is not competitive, would most likely become the chairman of the Oversight and Reform Committee’s Subcommittee on National Security in a GOP-controlled House. The broader committee’s investigative work is expected to take center stage in a new era of divided government. As subcommittee chairman, Grothman said he would aim to work closely with likely committee chairman James Comer to get to the bottom of what went wrong during the 2021 Afghanistan-withdrawal fiasco, by pressing the Biden administration to end its obstruction of the publication of a Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) report on the issue.
Domestically, Grothman said he sees education as a top priority. He claimed that “Democrats want an America where parents don’t have a say in how and what their children are taught in school,” which is why he is cosponsoring legislation that would prohibit federal funding from being used to produce “sexually oriented” programs or events for kids younger than ten years old.
As for the size and scope of government, Grothman said Republicans must restore “fiscal sanity” in Washington. “We have to do a much better job than we’ve done during the past two years of the Biden administration,” he said. “We must get back to where we’re keeping discretionary spending under control, and even look at mandatory spending because the welfare state has grown out of proportion.” On the other hand, when asked if he would be willing to restructure Social Security and Medicare to ensure their solvency, the congressman said that he doesn’t think that should be a top concern for a GOP-controlled Congress until “we take a look at all the other programs that are probably unconstitutional.”
Another priority for Republicans, Grothman said, is solving America’s immigration problems, which Democratic policies have exacerbated. “We have to go back to the Remain in Mexico policy. We have to look at the wall. We have to look at why so few people are being deported and stem the tide of illegal immigration. And ultimately, we have to look at establishing some sort of merit-based immigration system,” he said. He added that it’s impossible to overstate how far apart the two parties are on immigration, because “Democrats just want to ignore the issues at our southern border entirely.”
Lastly, Grothman asserted that Republicans are serious about rooting out corruption. “The Democrats aren’t capable of holding this administration accountable. The relationships between Joe Biden and his son and China and Ukraine are important to look at right now because they may be affecting U.S. policy towards those two countries.” Hunter Biden’s alleged dealings have featured heavily in GOP messaging this campaign season.
As for whether he thinks aid to Ukraine should be revisited, as House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy suggested might happen if the GOP recaptures the chamber, Grothman said, “I don’t have a problem with spending more money as long as it is complemented with an effort to end the hostilities.”