It’s always interesting to find out what Congressman Cline has to say when he is talking exclusively to a group of fellow Republicans and doesn’t feel a need to disguise his hyper-partisan far-right views.

So a report in The Winchester Star about Cline’s recent appearance at a meeting of the Frederick County Republican Committee was revealing.

Cline warned that “the left is on the march.” If by “left” he means everyone who cringes at the thought of Donald Trump serving another term as President and everyone who believes in reproductive freedom, he may be right.

Holding the pocket Constitution on Tuesday night, he called it “the document I continue to wave at my (Democratic) counterparts on the other side of the aisle all the time when I’m emphasizing that if it’s not in the Constitution, we shouldn’t be doing it.” 

Huh? Does that include, for example, space exploration? The Constitution neither allows nor forbids that. But it’s not “in the Constitution.”

And when the Trump, whom Cline has endorsed for President in 2024, declared that he wanted to terminate the Constitution in order to be reinstated as President, the congressman was notably silent.

“There is a group, and it is across the country, an insidious movement of leftists who are pushing the exact opposite of what we are pushing — one nation. Well, first of all, when you have open borders, you don’t have a nation,” Cline said. 

“They are fighting to remove God from the public square,” Cline said. “… We’ve got to fight back against that to make sure we have a vibrant public square that recognizes the founding fathers and their intent on founding a country on Judaeo-Christian principles.”

The Constitution which Cline claims to revere does not mention God or “Judaeo-Christian principles”– not even once. The only mention of religion is in the First Amendment, which states: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

When asked by an FCRC member if he believes Trump won the election in 2020, Cline responded, “I believe Donald J. Trump is going to win the election here in November alongside me and alongside other Republicans who are going to be in the majority, not just in the House but in the Senate as well.”

In other words, he didn’t answer the question.

He slammed the Senate border security bill that was negotiated by some Democrats and some Republicans, calling it a “Democrat bill in sheep’s clothing” negotiated in part by the “same Mitt Romney-Republicans that they always get.”

Never mind that Cline is openly trashing the 2012 Republican candidate for President. In fact the bill was negotiated by Republican Senator James Lankford of Oklahoma, one of the most conservative members of the Senate.

In a speech shortly before the expected failure of the deal, Lankford bemoaned the fact that some fellow Republicans were objecting to the bill for purely political reasons.

“Some of them have been very clear with me,” Lankford said of his GOP colleagues, “they have political differences with the bill. They say it’s the wrong time to solve the problem. We’ll let the presidential election solve this problem.”

Lankford went on to say that a “popular commentator” — without naming any names — threatened to “destroy” him if he negotiated the deal during a presidential election year, regardless of what was in it.

“I will do whatever I can to destroy you, because I do not want you to solve this during the presidential election,” Lankford recounted the commentator saying.

“By the way, they have been faithful to their promise, and have done everything they can to destroy me,” he added.

Did Cline also oppose the bill for strictly partisan political reasons too? Everything we know about him suggests he did.

In a separate conversation with a reporter, Cline was asked his position on Ukraine aid.

“I think that there is not a clear goal in terms of what victory looks like for Ukraine. The Biden administration refuses to give us that,” Cline said. “And so until there is a clear articulated goal for Ukraine and the money is followed, every dollar of taxpayer money, then we shouldn’t give any more.”

That drew a response from Rod Grandon, an Army veteran and a candidate for the Democratic nomination to run against Cline in the November 2024 election.

“If we don’t support Ukraine, we, the United States of America, will be weakened in the eyes of all, and in fact, it won’t just be a perception matter,” Grandon said. “Ronald Reagan would be flipping in his grave over Ben Cline and his colleagues’ approach.”

“It’s not a blank check. The vast majority of those funds go to American manufacturers who are producing the shells and the weapons that are then being transported over for use in Ukraine,” Grandon said. “We have the appropriate controls and processes for accounting for that money.” 

Did you know about Congressman Cline’s “telephone townhall” on Tuesday?

There was no mention of it on Cline’s congressional website, weekly newsletter, Facebook page or X account.

I phoned Cline’s Washington office on Wednesday morning to ask about it. The staff member who answered my call said participants were notified by phone a day or two beforehand. He took my contact information and promised I would be added to the list of those to be notified of future telephone townhalls for constituents in the central part of the Sixth District. He was unable to explain how the list was compiled. He promised to pass on to the Congressman my question about whether he will continue to hold in-person townhall meetings throughout the district.

So we will see. Meanwhile, if you want to be added to the list of those who supposedly will be contacted about future telephone townhalls, phone Cline’s office at (202) 225-5431.

Congressman Cline has yet to react publicly to the Alabama Supreme Court’s ruling last week that that frozen embryos are people.

The court ruled that “unborn children are ‘children’ … without exception based on developmental stage, physical location, or any other ancillary characteristics.”

But Cline must agree with the court’s decision because he is one of 124 House Republicans co-sponsoring HR 431: “To implement equal protection under the 14th article of amendment to the Constitution for the right to life of each born and preborn human person.”

According to the bill:

The terms “human person” and “human being” include each and every member of the species homo sapiens at all stages of life, including the moment of fertilization, cloning, or other moment at which an individual member of the human species comes into being.

Obviously the “preborn” include even the newest embryos, which are the result of fertilization, and which may consist of only a few dozen cells. And not every frozen embryo is successfully implanted. The bill Cline supports nonetheless would define each such embryo as a human child. Would the now-routine disposal of these embryos comprise murder?

As a result of the ruling, medical facilities in Alabama have put in-vitro fertilization procedures on hold. Ironically this will mean fewer births.

Of course HR 431 would not only apply to frozen embryos. It would be a nationwide ban on abortion from the moment of conception for any reason, including rape, incest or protecting the health or life of the mother– applying to 10-year-old girls as much as anyone else.

If Cline thinks I am misinterpreting the language of the bill, I hope he will provide his own interpretation.

Rather than working on the everyday needs of his constituents– for good-paying jobs, quality health care, affordable housing and secure retirements– Congressman Cline has devoted an awful lot of his time and effort over the past year to a partisan effort to uncover corrupt connections between President Biden and his family.

As a member of the House Judiciary Committee, Cline has been a loyal accomplice of chairman Jim Jordan in his attempt to find Biden-related criminality.

In June 2023 Cline identified Gal Luft, who claimed to have evidence against the Bidens, as a “brave whistleblower.” A month later Luft was indicted for acting as an unregistered agent for Chinese companies and for brokering arms deals between those companies, Iran and countries in the Middle East.

And that, apparently, was the last time Cline ever mentioned the “brave whistleblower” Luft.

This month, in a typically unchallenging interview by Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business, Cline claimed that Tony Bobulinski, a former business associate of Hunter Biden, gave the House Oversight and Accountability Committee “very damning testimony” against the Bidens. He left no doubt that he thinks President Biden should be impeached for bribery.

But CNN reported:

Over the past several years, Tony Bobulinski has seemingly shared his story with anyone who would listen, including the Trump campaign. But his loftiest claims — that Joe Biden was deeply involved in his son’s overseas business deals — are still uncorroborated and have been undercut by other key witnesses.

And ABC News reported:

The transcript of Bobulinski’s appearance appears to show that when pressed, Bobulinski — who [Oversight Committee Chairman James] Comer has described as “the one honest, credible guy that was involved with the Bidens” — could not point to direct evidence that Joe Biden was involved in his family’s business dealings.

And now yet another supposedly key witness against the Bidens– Alexander Smirnov– has been charged with lying about the family’s business dealing in Ukraine. Not only that, Smirnov told investigators that Russian intelligence officials provided him with misinformation about Hunter Biden.

Prosecutors also said Alexander Smirnov has been “actively peddling new lies that could impact US elections” after meeting with Russian spies late last year and that the fallout from his previous false bribery accusations about the Bidens “continue[s] to be felt to this day.”

So what now, Congressman Cline? It would be nice to think that you and your Republican colleagues will end your fruitless crusade to find evidence of corruption against the President.

But I’m afraid we know better by now.

As we await Congressman Cline’s expression of outrage about the apparent murder of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny in an Arctic prison camp (you are outraged, aren’t you, Congressman?), let’s look at Cline’s latest excuses for opposing further US aid to Ukraine as it fights to beat back murderous Russian aggression.

On February 13 the Senate voted 70 to 29 to provide $60 billion for military and economic aid to Ukraine and $14 billion for military aid to Israel, as well as humanitarian aid for Gaza and the West Bank and $4.8 billion to deter Chinese aggression in the Indo-Pacific. The funding is stalled in the House of Representatives.

Here is Cline on one of his favorite rightwing news sites, where he can be assured of unchallenging questions, denouncing the legislation.

“This bill…includes money for Ukraine following on the more than $100 billion that American taxpayers have already sent to Ukraine, when we have zero accountability for the dollars that have already been spent.”

Wrong. US aid to Ukraine totals closer to $75 billion, “which includes humanitarian, financial, and military support.” About 90 percent of that money is being spent in the USA for weapons, ammunition and supplies produced in American factories by thousands of American workers. And as the Institute for the Study of War reports, “US oversight is extensive, and Ukrainian government oversight and accountability is extensive and growing… Ukrainian and [Department of Defense] personnel have been working aggressively to continue to improve monitoring and tracking of US aid, and US DoD officials have stated that there is no evidence that US-provided military assistance to Ukraine has been misappropriated.”

“We have an administration that doesn’t know what success is, can’t define success in Ukraine, and wants to send more taxpayer dollars into this black hole of a proxy war.”

Congressman Cline: What sort of definition of “success” are you looking for? How about: Helping Ukraine resist, and ultimately defeat, Russian aggression. Does that work for you?

And what do you mean by a “proxy war”? Are you saying that the US is using Ukraine as a proxy in a war against Russia? Reminder: It was Russia that invaded Ukraine. Ukraine is fighting for its survival as a free and independent nation with the assistance of the US and many other countries. Without additional aid, Russia could crush Ukraine. Can you grasp that?

“And then you have aid to Israel, our dependable ally in the Middle East… We are willing to help our democratic ally Israel because of the historic cultural, national security and economic ties that bind us. But we can’t tie it to Ukrainian aid…”

Congressman Cline: Can’t you understand that Ukraine’s war against Russian aggression and Israel’s war against Hamas are tied together? Israelis like Amir Tibon understand it.

Shame on you too, Congressman Cline.

Along with his Republican colleague— the noted legal and constitutional scholar Marjorie Taylor (“in-dick-table”) Greene– Congressman Cline will serve as one of the managers of the Senate impeachment trial against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over his handling of the border.

The vote to impeach Mayorkas, by a one-vote margin, was almost strictly along party lines– only three brave Republicans voted NO. The matter now goes to the Senate, where there is absolutely no chance that Mayorkas will be convicted and removed from office.

Surely Cline knows this. So why is he pleased to waste time and taxpayers’ money on this partisan stunt?

Maybe it’s to distract attention from his refusal to support a compromise on border security that was negotiated by conservative Republican Senator James Lankford and endorsed by the Border Patrol union.

Cline should take note of the victory of Democrat Tom Suozzi in Tuesday’s special election for Congress in New York. Suozzi, who endorsed the compromise, easily beat his Republican opponent Mazi Pilip, who opposed it.

Here’s Congressman Cline’s all-too-predictable reaction to the bipartisan Senate plan to provide aid to Ukraine and Israel while implementing strict limits along the US southern border.

Notice Cline’s sneering hostility to the brave Ukrainians who have been resisting brutal Russian aggression for more than two years, and who badly need US military assistance to continue that resistance.

No, Congressman. This plan would not “send $48.4 billion dollars of hard-working American taxpayer dollars to Ukraine.” As conservative columnist Marc Theissen wrote in The Washington Post:

Here is the best-kept secret about U.S. military aid to Ukraine: Most of the money is being spent here in the United States. That’s right: Funds that lawmakers approve to arm Ukraine are not going directly to Ukraine but are being used stateside to build new weapons or to replace weapons sent to Kyiv from U.S. stockpiles. Of the $68 billion in military and related assistance Congress has approved since Russia invaded Ukraine, almost 90 percent is going to Americans, one analysis found.

That’s right. Aid to Ukraine is employing thousands of Americans while helping Ukrainians fight back against Vladimir Putin’s murderous expansionism. Too bad Cline has a problem with that.

As for the border deal that Cline denounces as “pro-illegal immigration”:

The deal will grant the Department of Homeland Security new emergency authority to clamp down on border crossings if daily average migrant encounters reach 4,000 over a one-week span. Once the authority is triggered, the DHS secretary could decide to largely bar migrants from seeking asylum if they crossed the border unlawfully.

If migrant crossings increased above 5,000 on average per day on a given week, DHS would be required to use the authority. The authority sunsets after three years.

Migrants could still seek asylum at a port of entry. The bill would codify a process that requires the government to process 1,400 asylum applications at ports of entry, while also raising the standard for asylum and expediting the process.

Those who didn’t qualify for asylum [including economic migrants] will be swiftly deported.

In addition the Senate bill provides for:

• Over 1,500 new U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) personnel including Border Patrol Agents and CBP Officers. 
• Over 4,300 new Asylum Officers and additional U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services staff to facilitate timely and fair decisions. 
• 100 new immigration judge teams to help reduce the asylum caseload backlog and adjudicate cases more quickly. 
• Shelter and critical services for newcomers in our cities and states.  
• 1,200 new U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel for functions including enforcement and deportations. 

It’s no secret that Donald Trump wants the crisis at the border as an issue in the 2024 Presidential campaign and is not interested in a bipartisan solution. And Republicans like Ben Cline are happy to oblige.

Republican Senator Mitt Romney, who repeatedly puts Ben Cline to shame, got it right:

“I think the border is a very important issue for Donald Trump,” Romney said. “And the fact that he would communicate to Republican senators and congresspeople that he doesn’t want us to solve the border problem because he wants to blame Biden for it is really appalling.”