On Thursday, I had a column on the homepage about House minority leader Kevin McCarthy’s dithering over whether Republicans will participate in the House select-committee investigation of the January 6 Capitol riot. The problem, at root, is the vexing one we’ve explored a number of times before, most notably in connection with the House GOP caucus’s ouster of Liz Cheney from her leadership post: What to do about Donald Trump’s influence?
Another iteration of the infighting and dysfunction stemming from that influence was this week’s brouhaha caused by the former president’s false claim that Bill McSwain, the former U.S. attorney Trump appointed for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (which includes the Philadelphia area), was blocked from investigating election fraud by Bill Barr, Trump’s former attorney general and current piñata of choice.
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