Ben Cline, landslided in his 2024 bid for the chair post in the Republican Study Committee, thinks he has the inside track to being named the chair next year.
One problem there: he’s not going to be in Congress next year.
The boundary lines for Cline’s Sixth District seat are set to be redrawn, pending an April 21 referendum on congressional redistricting, with Democrats intent on creating a map with 10 of the 11 seats in the U.S. House from Virginia being lean-D or strong-D seats.
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The one safe-Republican seat would be the current Ninth District, which is represented by Morgan Griffith, down in Southwest Virginia.
Cline, who lives in Botetourt County, which is north of Roanoke, would see the lines of his Sixth District seat redrawn to include left-leaning Charlottesville and Albemarle County, along with Democrat-majority cities Harrisonburg, Staunton and Waynesboro.
Talk about counting one’s chickens before they hatch.
“I plan on running in the Sixth District as currently drawn,” Cline told Punchbowl News in an interview published on Thursday. “The appetite, in my view, is not there to undo the work of the nonpartisan commission and the will of the voters.”
Oh, but there is.
Virginia gave Abigail Spanberger a 15-point win and a Democratic sweep in the November state elections, and Democrats picked up 13 seats in the House of Delegates to get to a 64-36 majority – with congressional redistricting a featured issue on the ballot.
Cline already has a slew of Democratic challengers lining up to take him on in November, led by former Fifth District Congressman Tom Perriello and bestselling author and journalist Beth Macy.
It’s odd that he would jump out about this Republican Study Committee thing 10 months ahead of the post-2026 midterm election vote.
“I’ve been honored to receive support from across the conference and a majority of members of the Republican Study Committee who would be coming back and voting,” Cline told Punchbowl News.
Not including him there.
Cline lost to a Texas Republican named August Pfluger by an 80-57 margin when he ran for the chair position in this RSC thing, which includes 188 of the 218 members of the House Republican Caucus, in 2024.
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Former RSC chairs include Mike Pence, who went on to become governor of Indiana and then vice president, before a MAGA mob threatened to hang him on Jan. 6, 2021; and Mike Johnson, who is the current House Speaker.
Too bad for Ben Cline that he won’t be able to add his name to that illustrious list.