Republican extremists discovered the consequences of going too far | Opinion

When I look back on the Idaho Legislature I met up with in 2003 as the new president of Boise State University, it bears little resemblance to recent legislative assemblies overwhelmed by extremist Republicans who seem intent on attacking state government’s mission of providing for and protecting Idahoans.

It was long before Donald Trump polluted the Republican Party and drove away many GOP members who believed in government staying out of people’s private lives. It was a day when legislators of both parties respected public education and, in the case of higher education, supported presidents and faculties moving their institutions forward in support of a growing state economy.

In recent years, it seems that Idaho’s Republican leadership has been held hostage by a few legislators driving the party to the far right. This new majority shifts its support to private education and searches for ways to trim state support for higher education, which they have done quite successfully in recent years.

University presidents left to defend their budgets, and their academic and research programming, do so without any apparent support or leadership from the State Board of Education, even when diversity and inclusion is attacked and dismembered at Idaho’s universities — while Micron’s website extols the value of diversity and inclusion.

Instead, it’s a simple salute to the powers that be. The few Democrats in the Legislature speak for so many Idahoans who have no voice or representation, but they are too often outvoted by Republican majorities who devour the tripe that far-right Republicans write into legislation as though it’s a steak dinner.

There are at least two ways to check the extreme power of a Republican-dominated Legislature that writes its credo of Christian nationalism, patriarchal and misogynistic bigotry, and whitewashed views of American history into state law. Either do it with the governor’s veto pen or do it at the ballot box.

Let’s take the governor’s veto pen first. Conventional wisdom suggests that Gov. Brad Little, apparently out of fear of losing the primary to one of the wingnuts waiting to oppose him, chose over recent years to fall in line with the right wing of his party, even though he still has a moderate streak of Republicanism left in his right-wing ravaged bill signings.

Or perhaps, contrary to conventional wisdom, Little is entirely comfortable with the extremists in the Legislature, but enjoys the reputation as a moderate forced into compliance with the far right because there are far worse prospects for the governor lurking on that side of the political spectrum.

Either way, he gets another term of office, which seems his most important objective.

In some cases where Little should have used his veto to extinguish extremist legislation, he signed the bills and then explained in what is termed “a transmittal letter” to the Legislature what was wrong with the legislation he signed. That seems to be his way of having his cake and eating it, too.

And, of course, the Republican-dominated state Legislature, driven to extremes by the far right, can override a veto, so a governor’s ability to check its work can be limited.

A more certain way to reverse the impact of extremist legislators on Idaho state law is to throw the rascals out, as the old saying goes about those who misuse the authority of their office. In the recent May primary, that is exactly what happened in some places, as the “Gang of Eight” band of legislators was reduced to a denuded trio, with five of their ranks defeated.

It’s not just a lesson in payback for straying too far from the center of Republican thinking. It is also a lesson in how Trump’s perfected strategy of striking back at anyone who opposes him can be used by those who believe Trump-MAGA policies and the policies of Idaho’s wingnuts have veered so far to the right that they are now doing damage to members of their own party.

What’s surprising about this pattern of pushback in the primary is who’s behind the plow, a less than veiled reference to Idaho agriculture, hardly an industry known for taking on Republican candidates for office. But that is just what agriculture did in the recent primary election.

Extremist Republicans made the mistake of taking on immigration as their favorite whipping boy. That may work for a saloon owner in Eagle, who unsuccessfully challenged Little in the recent May primary and is far removed from those bringing Idaho’s breadbasket to market, but it has little traction across rural Idaho — where generations of immigrants have worked the fields, enriching their communities and the state’s economy.

If that’s not enough of a damper on Republican lawmakers who do damage to the Idaho economy, then watch this November’s election, when Independent Todd Achilles challenges U.S. Sen. Jim Risch.

To date, Risch is a silent partner of Trump’s, imposing tariffs abroad that have come back to harm Idaho agriculture. Whether it’s grocery prices or inflated costs at the gas pump because of the ill-chosen and poorly executed Trump war in Iran, Risch — as chair of the once-powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee — refuses to exercise the power and authority of that role, leaving Idahoans to feel the pinch of Trump’s convoluted foreign and domestic policies.

A somewhat different day could be dawning for Idahoans — a day when Idahoans reject the extremism that Idaho’s Republican elected officials have either encouraged or turned a blind eye to. Now the chickens are coming home to roost, as Idahoans begin to understand how Republican officeholders like Risch, slavish to Trump policies and captive to Trump’s primary threats, are doing serious damage to those who always counted on the GOP to act in the best interests of Idahoans.

Billionaires may fund the campaign coffers of extremist Republicans, but it’s voters like those who showed up at the recent Republican primary and ousted the far-right people from office who can yank politicians from their complacency, their arrogance of power and their blind loyalty to policies gone wrong for Idahoans.

The people of Idaho have spoken, and it ain’t over yet.

Bob Kustra served as president of Boise State University from 2003 to 2018. He is host of Readers Corner on Boise State Public Radio, a columnist for the Idaho Statesman and a columnist for the Chicago Tribune. He served two terms as Illinois lieutenant governor and 10 years as a state legislator.