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'You did the unthinkable': Ohio's Anthony Gonzalez faces fury over impeachment vote
By Dan Merica, CNN
Updated 3:22 PM ET, Sat February 20, 2021
Medina, Ohio (CNN) To Shannon Burns, the betrayal that local Republicans felt when Ohio State wide receiver-turned-Republican-congressman Anthony Gonzalez voted to impeach then-President Donald Trump was analogous to only one other disloyalty: Suiting up for Michigan.
"This is like him playing for the Buckeyes again, getting down to the two-minute warning, running into the locker room, getting a Michigan jersey and running back out," said Burns, who runs the Strongsville GOP, a grassroots organization that once backed Gonzalez. "It's not that you turned your back or you did something that we didn't like. You did the unthinkable."
Gonzalez's decision to join just nine other House Republicans and all House Democrats to impeach Trump in January has unearthed profound anger in his northeast Ohio district, kicking off a localized fight over the future of the Republican Party that pits the two-term congressman against irate constituents eager to expel any Republican who crosses the former President.
Numerous county parties have either censured or publicly decried him, grassroots organizations once aligned with the congressman have taken back their endorsements and fellow Republican have begun lining up to oust him in a primary.
"He's a traitor," said Mike Ryan, a 50-year-old Republican who voted for Gonzalez in 2020 but now wants to see him ousted from office.
Gonzalez, who easily won reelection in 2020 after first winning the seat in 2018, has remained defiant in the face of criticism, telling local outlets that he does not regret the vote and is willing to lose his seat over the decision.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/20/politics/oh...
Sunday, February 28th 2021 at 2:03PM
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