Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) has only been in the Senate for nine months, but he has quickly become one of the worst and weirdest members of the upper chamber.
Gallego and fellow Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) staged a confrontation with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) in an effort to score some kind of propaganda win that could be stuffed into Democratic ads. It was an embarrassing stunt that resulted in Johnson and Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) running circles around them in the argument, with Gallego being reduced to claiming that the GOP will “kill healthcare” because Republicans won’t continue subsidizing failed Obamacare policies.
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Johnson touched on the argument in a CNN interview, so Gallego decided to respond to it like a perpetually online social media live streamer reacting to a YouTube video. Gallego whined about Johnson’s pronunciation of his name and called Johnson a “f***ing liar” and a “little creep,” which he has done repeatedly. Gallego also said Johnson “should be happy I had my arms folded” because “Marines fold their arms” as a “way to make sure that we restrain ourselves.”
Gallego got rhetorically boxed into a corner and his reaction was to say that Johnson is lucky that Gallego didn’t try to fight him. Combine that with the forced foul language to try to present himself as a tough guy, and this is not exactly the normal, stable, authentic behavior you should expect from a senator.
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Gallego’s obnoxious, aggressive messaging is part of the Democratic strategy of pretending to be tough and presenting oneself as a “fighter” to rile up the left-wing Democratic base. As Gallego told Democrats in Pennsylvania, the plan is to “be mad, stay mad.” So Gallego is running around calling Johnson a “creep,” whining about everything he says, and talking about how lucky Johnson is that Gallego isn’t going to beat him up.
It puts Gallego near the top of the list of worst and weirdest senators early in his tenure. His embarrassing fake tough guy routine masks the fact that he is out of his depth trying to debate his conservative counterparts and the fact that Democrats are rudderless as they fight to keep the government shut down. Worst of all, Gallego represents the next generation of Democratic politicians, meaning more and more Democratic members of Congress will behave like him in the future.
