January 29, 2021

Florida Man Goes to Wyoming to Cancel His GOP Colleague

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Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) thinks cancel culture has gone much, much too far. Though the definition of cancel culture is extremely elastic and typically only deployed in bad faith attacks, Republicans have created a vast ecosystem of complaining about the horrors of liberals “canceling” others for the crime of merely speaking their minds. But the term is so thrilling, it has now morphed into canceling a conservative who dares to have a different opinion or, apparently, when Democrats demand accountability for inciting an insurrection. If Donald Trump, as the president of the United States, can’t incite a deadly attack on the Capitol after lying for months about the election being stolen from him without being canceled, are any of us safe from cancellation? 

As Gaetz tweeted about a proceeding that is designed to hold presidents accountable for crimes and is enshrined in the Constitution:

Then, just three days after lamenting cancel culture run amok in those seven, eloquent words, Gaetz boarded a plane to excoriate one of his Republican colleagues for having the nerve to disagree with him, and, of course, the former president.

Earlier this month, after then-president Donald Trump encouraged a mob of his supporters to storm the Capitol building, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) joined nine other members of her party and voted to impeach him. To Gaetz, who presumably loves the marketplace of ideas that has been so undermined by cancel culture, Cheney’s vote was beyond the pale. So he decided to take the battle to Cheney’s home state. 

Other Trump loyalist GOP House members, like Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), had already begun making moves to do their own Congressional version of canceling the third-term Wyoming representative. They attempted to strip Cheney of her leadership roles in the party soon after the House voted to impeach Trump a second time. But a Florida representative flying across the country solely for the purpose of rallying against his colleague for breaking with Trump is absolutely farcical. And alas, this transparently hypocritical move probably won’t inspire Republicans to stop complaining about cancel culture. But it’s extremely instructive in figuring out what cancel culture really is: Basically anything Matt Gaetz doesn’t like. 

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

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