Now that carpetbagger Lauren Boebert has officially lost her congressional seat to retired Rear Admiral Eileen Laubacher, I have a confession to make.
I’m going to miss her.
As we waited in recent weeks for the Associated Press to confirm what we already knew – that Boebert had finally made his way out of government in embarrassment – I realized just how much.
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She was my reference. She was always there when I needed her – and when I didn’t – to help me prepare for my next column. It’s bad enough that Jared Polis is term limited, Tina Peters is mostly off the radar, and Pete Hegseth — as Ted Cruz predicted, and the valiant Tomb of the Unknown Soldier Sentinel predicted — will either have to resign or be fired before he is inevitably impeached. Of course, he could have been impeached last Tuesday if 11 Democrats — including Colorado’s Brittany Pettersen — had managed to show up in time to vote.
Luckily, I still have Trump for the next two years. And Stephen Miller at the helm. Jim Jordan as House Minority Leader. You can bet that as bad as Trump’s second term was, the second half of his second term, even with a Democratic Congress, will be exponentially worse.
But this is how much Boebert hurts me as she leaves Congress. So far – I’m still waiting – she hasn’t called the election rigged, even though she blamed the defeat on almost everyone and everything except herself. She said nothing about a recount, even though her lawyer, Scott Gessler, had promised one, pointing to “unusual voting patterns,” which can happen when you lose a district that Trump won by 18 points — and she won by 11 — in 2024.
According to a Colorado Sun analysis, Boebert’s defeat made her “one of the worst-performing (GOP) incumbents” in the Democratic landslide. It’s in the election itself. How do you think she rated her three terms in Congress? Definitely top five.
But for me this was the hardest blow: she apparently promised not to run in 2028 to try to win back her seat. I hope they were wrong. As I write this on Friday, not all quotes are available yet, so it may not be final.
I mean, what am I saying now that I haven’t said before about Boebert with her Glock, other than she officially lost the race on Friday the 13th, which I guess wasn’t bad luck for the nearly 188,000 people who voted against her.
What am I going to do without being able to call Boebert, as I do in every “Beetlejuice” column mentioning her, a carpet canoodler?
(Note to my editor: I think the title of this column, as far as Boebert is concerned, should be: “Carpetbagging Canoodler Canned.” That’s how the New York Post would do it anyway.)
When I say I’ll miss Boebert, I don’t mean miss her Exactly. I’m not talking about his inappropriate behavior, his rudeness, his belief that his role in Congress was to be performative and not actually do his job.
I mean, as a professional, I will miss the absurdity of her presence in Congress, the soap opera that is her personal life, the ups and downs of her relationships, especially with Donald Trump, who calls her “stupid” and “feeble-minded” one day, then a “MAGA Warrior” the next. (Actually, after doing the math, I think Boebert can be all three.)
The other night on 9News, Kyle Clark jokingly explained why Boebert’s departure from the political scene would be bad for Democrats since she presents a nationwide fundraising bonanza for Democrats every time she shows up and every time she speaks.
What are the chances, he asked, that without Boebert in the race, Laubacher — who outscored Boebert 13 to 1 and won by just over 3,000 votes — could keep his seat in Colorado’s reddest district against a normal Republican (assuming they can find one)?
I don’t plan to exclude Laubacher yet. She was a Republican before running as a Democrat against Boebert. Maybe she’s the normal Republican, who recognizes how disgusting MAGA Republicans have become, that we’ve been waiting for.
OK, maybe that’s a little bad for Colorado Democrats, although I’m pretty sure everyone is excited about the Democrats’ landslide and how they flipped three out of four seats in the House of Representatives, giving Colorado now a 7-to-1 Democratic delegation. It’s not really ironic, but it’s funny, that Jeff Hurd, the last Republican standing in Colorado, represents the 3rd CD, which Boebert abandoned after having barely managed to do so in 2022.
But as bad as it might be for anyone else, it’s certainly worse for the Colorado columnists (and Clark, by the way) who can only watch as Boebert hides — OK, no matter what, she won’t hide — unloading several tons of baggage along the way.
I want to collect the luggage. I want the Beetlejuice jokes back. (Cleanest from The Daily Show’s Desi Lydic: “Just like the security guard in ‘Beetlejuice, the Musical,’ voters are forcing Lauren Boebert out of her seat.” For practical jokes, click here.)
So what will Boebert do next? I saw a blogger recommending which Broadway shows she might want to see now that she has time. “Bad,” of course. I would add “Fangirls”. “Hadestown.” I know, maybe if they bring back “Annie Get Your Gun.”
But maybe she doesn’t have the money. For those who think that the three-term MP will leave with a large pension and will be able, for example, to provide care for her grandson’s children, think again. She won’t be able to collect her pension until age 62 – at which point I may not write again – and it will amount to something like $800 a month in today’s money.
I guess she needs a job. I suggested that she could land a job at Fox News, but that she would probably have to dye her hair blonde, which could be a deal breaker. But even Trump and Fox News have fallen out.
Maybe she could be Trump’s next press secretary. There is an opening, and Boebert certainly has the fighting spirit for the job, if not exactly the political chops. I’d bet it would last longer than a Katie Zacharia (which, you’ll recall, is half a Scaramucci, or five days).
But if she’s truly stuck in her job search, where could an experienced bagger like Boebert turn?
There’s always Wyoming.
Mike Littwin has been a columnist for too many years to count. He’s covered Dr. J, four presidential inaugurations, six national conventions and countless mind-numbing speeches in the snow of New Hampshire and Iowa.. Subscribe to Mike’s newsletter.
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