Fox News contributor and former GOP congressman Jason Chaffetz said Monday he was “surprised” retired House speaker John Boehner called him an “asshole” and “total phony” in a candid interview published Sunday.
“I held no ill will towards the speaker, but I was a little surprised to see that,” Chaffetz told Fox News of the colorful quotes about congressional Republican dynamics. “John Boehner supported my run for chairman of the [House] Oversight Committee. I wouldn’t have been the chairman if it weren’t for John Boehner.”
Chaffetz served as chairman of the powerful body from 2015 to 2017, which he used as a vehicle to extensively investigate Hillary Clinton’s tenure as Secretary of State and the Obama administration more broadly, before leaving Capitol Hill in June.
Chaffetz said his relationship with Boehner, who was speaker from 2011 to 2015, may have deteriorated because “there’s an expectation from the senior most leadership that you hand over your voting card, and you get in line, and you support everything they did.”
“And I just wasn’t that guy and that’s not what I did,” Chaffetz continued.
Boehner made the comments in an interview with Politico while discussing how Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., took over leadership of the committee.
“Gowdy, that’s my guy, even though he doesn’t know how to dress,” Boehner told Politico.
“Fuck Jordan. Fuck Chaffetz,” he added, referring to the founding chairman of the House Freedom Caucus Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio. “They’re both assholes.”
Chaffetz told Fox News he was happy to be compared to Jordan.
“If you’re going to lump me together with Jim Jordan, I’m okay with that,” Chaffetz said.
