At least one Cincinnati-area Republican lawmaker has joined the chorus of conservatives calling for President Joe Biden's resignation over the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan.
Most Republican lawmakers who represent the region have stopped short of calling for what would be the second presidential resignation in history, opting instead to just criticize the president.
U.S. Rep. Warren Davidson, a Republican whose district covers suburban Butler County just north of Cincinnati, called for Biden's resignation.
Davidson and his Ohio Republican colleague in the House, Rep. Jim Jordan, accused Biden of leaving Americans behind in Afghanistan. Jordan, R-Urbana, also called on Biden to resign.
When the final American troops left Afghanistan Aug. 31, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said less than 200 U.S. citizens remained in the county, many with dual citizenship in Afghanistan.
Rep. Warren Davidson, R-Troy
Davidson, a Republican from Troy, tweeted after a briefing on Aug. 24 that not only should Biden resign, but the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Defense, and the Secretary of Homeland Security should be fired.
When asked by The Enquirer why he thinks Afghanistan rises to the level that would require a president to resign, Davidson sent a brief statement.
"He knowingly left American citizens behind in Afghanistan," Davidson said in the statement. "He and his Secretaries of State and Defense, along with the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, need to resign or be fired.”
He elaborated more on Fox News Radio's Fox Across America with Jimmy Failla on Aug. 30 that he thinks the withdrawal jeopardizes America's interests elsewhere.
"There's no place around the world that this national security team is going to go and have anybody's confidence they're going to advance American national security interests," Davidson said. "No one should trust they're going to make good judgment calls."
The rest of the Republican delegation in the area hasn't called on Biden to resign.
Rep. Steve Chabot, R-Westwood
Chabot, in a blog post on Aug. 25, said the withdrawal from Afghanistan "may be the worst foreign policy catastrophe in American history."
But he doesn't think Biden should resign because that would make Vice President Kamala Harris president.
"And her record thus far on things Biden has tasked her with is anything but impressive," Chabot wrote.
Chabot ended by suggesting Republicans take back the House and Senate next year and beat Biden and Harris in 2024, then adds "some would say, again."
Chabot didn't respond to The Enquirer's request to clarify what he meant by that and whether he ascribes to debunked conspiracy theories regarding the 2020 presidential election.
Rep. Brad Wenstrup, R-Columbia Tusculum
Wenstrup hasn't publicly called for Biden to step down. He didn't respond to messages seeking comment.
Wenstrup, an officer in the U.S. Army Reserves, has made public statements condemning the withdrawal and how easily the Taliban regained control of the country.
"I am furious and sickened that the situation on the ground has deteriorated so swiftly that an attack of this magnitude was able to occur," Wenstrup said in a statement Aug. 26.
Sen. Rob Portman, R-Terrace Park
Portman hasn't called for the president to resign. Instead, Portman, in a statement on Aug. 30, Portman called on the Biden administration to come up with a counter-terrorism plan and a way to vet Afghan refugees "so we can come together as a nation to welcome people who have been screened and who have stood with us in war-torn Afghanistan.”
"I did not agree with how President Biden chose to withdraw forces from Afghanistan because I believe that any withdrawal should have been based on the conditions on the ground, not on an artificial timeline," Portman said.
Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Garrison
Two Republican lawmakers who represent Northern Kentucky for years have called for the U.S. to withdraw troops from Afghanistan, Rep. Thomas Massie and Sen. Rand Paul.
While both have been critical of how Biden handled the withdrawal, neither Massie nor Paul have publicly called for the president to resign over it. Neither responded to The Enquirer's request for comment.
"Leaving Afghanistan was the right thing to do," Massie tweeted on August 18. "But one of the ways in which the withdrawal was bungled (due to arrogance of Neocons who thought they had taught Afghan security forces to care), is the breadth and depth of US weaponry that immediately fell into Taliban hands."
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Bowling Green, Kentucky
As recently as Feb. 3, Paul took to Twitter to urge Biden to bring the troops home. He was responding to a report the administration had plans to break the agreement Trump brokered with the Taliban to withdraw troops by May.
"This would be a horrible start to @POTUS’s administration. Bring them home!," Paul tweeted Feb. 3.
In recent stop at the end of August to the Northern Kentucky suburb of Cold Spring, Paul criticized the president for allowing airbases to fall to the Taliban and reports that the administration shared information to the Taliban about evacuees.
"It is an utter disgrace what's going on over there, it is incompetence on steroids," Paul said in Cold Spring. "I've never seen such incompetence."
Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Louisville
In a press conference a week ago in Kentucky, the Senate minority leader said he won't call for Biden to resign.
"He’s not going to do that," McConnell said in the press conference. "It’s a Democratic House, Democratic Senate, Democratic President. In a practical matter, he’s not going anywhere. There will be a midterm report card in the fall of ’22 and then in ’24 if he chooses to run again, the American people can decide whether they want more of the same."
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