Your support helps us to tell the story
Barbara Comstock wants people to know that she is still very much a Republican — despite the fact she is voting for Kamala Harris.
“Tonight, I'm going to a Larry Hogan event,” the former Republican congresswoman told The Independent, in reference to the former governor and Republican Senate nominee in Maryland. But she said that former president Donald Trump was damaging the GOP, and in particular slammed Trump’s running mate, JD Vance.
“While Republicans probably, certainly look to gain the Senate [in general], they are going to lose a number of winnable Senate seats,” she said, adding that Vance “is such a non-starter for me” because of his “misogyny”.
On Thursday, Comstock led an an event in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia to convince her fellow Republicans to vote for Harris, too. She was joined by former Republican congressman Denver Riggleman and former Trump administration official Olivia Troye, both of whom have emerged as major critics of Trump in the past few months.
Throughout the event, each of the speakers emphasized their conservative credentials. Comstock talked about how she grew up in a family of Massachusetts Democrats, but was convinced to join the Republican Party when she interned for Ted Kennedy. She worked for numerous Republican administrations before serving in Congress.
Riggleman discussed his time in the House Freedom Caucus, the group of right-wing hellraisers who often accuse other Republicans of being insufficiently conservative. Meanwhile, Troye spoke about her four years in the GOP.
Harris has actively courted Republicans throughout her campaign, receiving the backing of some elected officials, as well as former staffers for the Bush and Reagan administration and staff for the late John McCain. Troye even spoke at the Democratic National Convention.
“What we're saying is, we don't have to be in agreement with everything when it comes to Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. But we can agree on fundamental things, like: we want to preserve our democracy,” she told The Independent. “We want to be strong on national security. We don't want someone that's cavorting with dictators and lauding praise on dictators like Donald Trump did during the debate.”
Troye also noted that she is neighbors with JD Vance, who she referred to as “anti-women”.
Attendees at the event talked up their Republican credentials while explaining their decision to vote for Harris. Faith Rodill, who brought her young daughter along to the event, told The Independent that she had worked with numerous Republican members of Congress but “I'm worried about the future of my children, especially my daughters, and having an example of the former president who's trying to get his job back is just absolutely unacceptable.”
“I'm really jazzed to have my daughter see that justice needs to prevail,” she added.
Specifically, Rodill expressed her concern about reproductive rights being taken away from women.
“It shouldn't even be a question that, at the end of the day, these conversations need to be with a woman, her partner or her religious leader, not by the government whatsoever. I don't want that taken away from my girls,” Rodill said.
Steve Devine said that he had worked on Richard Nixon’s re-election campaign, but called Nixon “quaint by comparison” with Trump.
“Donald Trump is a convicted felon, and guess what? He's going to be convicted of a whole lot more if he doesn't get elected — and make sure the charges are dismissed,” he said. “This guy’s a bad guy. He is not interested in representational, constitutional democracy.”
Riggleman said that Harris’s campaign has been incredibly welcoming to Republicans, which is a good sign for how she should govern.
“I think there should be, literally, Republicans at the White House with her after she's elected, just to talk to her about what we've seen, what we've done,” he told The Independent. For her part, Harris expressed openness to hiring a Republican in her administration during her first sitdown interview with CNN.
Many other notable Republicans — such as former members of Congress Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, both of whom voted to convict Trump for his actions on January 6 and worked on the select committee investigating the riot, as well as former vice president Dick Cheney — have all indicated they will vote for Harris.
Comstock noted that while Virginia is seen as a state that will likely vote Democratic, she was also going to push for her relatives in Pennsylvania and North Carolina to break for Harris, particularly her Catholic family members.
“I’m proud of my family, my Catholic family, who [Trump] said shouldn’t be voting for Harris,” she said, referencing a recent speech during which Trump said Catholics considering voting for Harris should “have their heads examined”.
“Most of my Catholic family is [voting for Harris],” Comstock added. “Particularly the ones in the swing states.”
A previous version of this story misspelled Steve Devine’s name as Steve Devaine. This has been corrected
