State GOP Chair Steps Down After History of Embarrassing Gaffes

GOP Chair Susan Hutchison is out. HG

Sponsored Port Townsend Film Festival Stream 24/7 - Watch 75 curated films with filmmaker interviews & special events. Support local arts!

On Tuesday, state GOP chair and former TV news anchor Susan Hutchison announced that she will be stepping down from her position as the head of Washington Republicans. Unlike other recently departed public figures, Hutchison isn't accused of touching anyone's butt, at least as far as we know. Rather, there is some speculation that she's leaving because she's been offered a position in the Trump administration, so while she may not personally be a sexual harasser, she'll soon be working for (an alleged) one.

Let's take a tour of Hutchison's greatest hits, shall we?

☻ During her run for King County Executive in 2009, Hutchison recounted meeting famed biologist and athiest Richard Dawkins. At the time, Hutchison was serving as executive director of Microsoft billionaire Charles Simonyi's Fund for Arts and Sciences, and Dawkins had previously held an endowed chair position at Oxford funded by Simonyi. According to Hutchison, during a breakfast meeting with Dawkins and others, the two got into a heated argument about the existence of Jesus, at which point, according to Seattle Weekly, Hutchison said that she "took Dawkins' face in her hands as you would a child's, stressed their Simonyi connection, and told him they would get along." Dawkins, however, remembered the encounter differently. "It is true we had an argument, which was actually, at least for a short time, more acrimonious than she says. But it was not about Jesus," he told the Weekly. "I do not believe she ever mentioned Jesus or her religious beliefs during the whole dinner. I am sure I would have remembered that, because I would have been so flabbergasted at the idea of Charles Simonyi appointing a religious nut to manage his foundation. What I remember with the utmost clarity was that our argument was about George W. Bush. She told me that she voted for Bush, and I was utterly shocked." Hutchison, who at the time refused to disclose her party affliliation, later lost the King County Executive race to Dow Constantine.

☻ After Seattle passed an income tax on high earners last summer, Hutchison called it "a veiled attempt to turn over the constitution" and urged rich people to engage in "civil disobedience" by refusing to pay it. (As Heidi noted, the income tax would would raise about $140 million a year and ease the existing tax burden on low income people, according to estimates from the city.)

☻ After Trump's infamous "grab 'em by the pussy" remarks became public last year, Hutchison excused the failed steak salesman and (alleged) serial harasser by saying he was "channeling Bill Clinton." She also said his comments didn't count(??) because at the time Trump was a registered Democrat.

☻ She called Ted Cruz a "traitor" during the Republican National Convention last year—because he wasn't pro-Trump enough. To her credit, she did say it to his face.

☻ Her preferred pronoun is "ballot babe," an odd and seemingly sexist term she used to refer to herself during a robocall prior to the 2016 election.

☻ In an open letter to Gov. Jay Inslee, Hutchison said that the difference between Vietnamese refugees in the 1970s and Syrian refugees now is that Syrians fleeing the humanitarian disaster that is their homeland are part of the "ISIS JV team." And, she added, what refugees really want is... charter schools.

We'll leave the final words to Erik Houser, a smart guy on Twitter and the source of many of these greatest hits: "Susan Hutchison's true legacy is one of misleading and unfair attacks, enthusiastic support of the most awful politician in American history, and, thankfully, many many electoral losses. We're gonna miss her!"

Bye, girl. Bye.