“Abysmal failure”

Rep. Bob Good, R-Va., represents Virginia’s 5th Congressional District—for the next two weeks, at least. He lost a narrow primary race plus an August recount to John McGuire, a Trump endorsee who will take Good’s place in the 119th Congress. The recount found only 366 votes separating the two Republicans.

After the primary loss, Good gave up his chairmanship of the House Freedom Caucus, the rightmost wing of the Republican Party. On Thursday, he sat down with WORLD to discuss his election loss, his criticisms of current GOP leadership, and his future plans.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

You were first elected four years ago, in 2020. Then in 2022 and this year, Republicans have won a majority in the House. What changed?

“My first two years were when we suffered under the total control by Democrats. [President Joe] Biden had just won, and they had the House and the Senate as well, and they were able to ram through essentially their entire agenda. Under the full control of the Democrats, and Republicans were largely just protesters, if you will. All we could really do was to vote against the Democrat agenda. But the House is the greatest indicator of where the people are because it’s proportional. The American people trusted us with the House, and we squandered that trust. We have nothing to show for our two years of House control on every major piece of spending legislation under the previous speaker and under the current speaker.”

You were head of the House Freedom Caucus, which spearheaded the removal of former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. Then it took weeks to get current House Speaker Mike Johnson installed. Why do you think that change was needed, and did it achieve the goals you hoped it would?

“Under Republican leadership for the past 15 years, all the massive spending bills and must-pass legislation was passed with profoundly Democratic votes. Why would we elevate someone like McCarthy who represented all those years of failure? However, I was hopeful with Speaker Johnson because he is an expressed conservative. But I saw the speakership change him almost immediately.”

How so?

“The high-water mark for Mike Johnson was when I and some of my House Freedom Caucus colleagues told him to send the Senate a standalone Israel bill, to separate it from their desire to fund Ukraine and other foreign aid. Johnson did that. But then I watched him change his views on Ukraine funding. We tried to get him to use the spending battles to secure the border. He refused to do that. He flipped in favor of Ukraine funding and we didn’t even get any border security for it. He abandoned his own stated position against major funding bills, and then he passed two minibuses, predominantly with Democrat votes. He’s failed the country, and he’s failed Republicans.”

Last month, Republicans won majorities in the House and the Senate, and President-elect Donald Trump won the popular vote. So what do you expect from the next Congress?

“Well, I have hope, and then I have expectation, which are not the same things. President Trump does have some degree of a mandate. He has a lot of momentum behind him. If the Republicans have resolve, they can do almost anything. The problem right now with Speaker Johnson is he thinks it’s worse to not do anything than it is to do something bad. He will say, ‘Oh, this is what I’d like to do. Hey, Chuck Schumer, can we do this? Oh gosh, you guys won’t. OK, people, we fought, but they said no.’ We’ve got to be willing to exercise walk-away leadership, to walk away from a deal rather than do a bad deal. And Republicans haven’t shown a willingness to do that.”

Government funding runs out later this month. Don’t Republicans need to work with Democrats on passing a bill to prevent a shutdown?

“What I would like us to do is, first, do no harm. We shouldn’t be fearful of a government shutdown. We have in place, after two years of Republican control, all the Democrat policies and spending levels that were in place when they had full control of government. Because we’ve refused to walk away. Based on past history, there’s a great risk that we will do a bad deal, something that the Democrats like just to stay open. I think they’ll do a massive year-end spending bill that goes until next September.”

So what is your view on bipartisanship?

“Bipartisanship just means you don’t stand for anything. The Democrat Party is the party that’s antifamily and antimorality. How do you compromise with that? If you have the majority, and you have the power the people trusted you with, then utilize that to help the people, to save the country, to undo the harm that’s been done. I don’t know what there is for me to work with Democrats on because they have an opposite worldview of me on virtually every issue.”

Is this why many of your colleagues have called you the least likeable person in Congress?

“I didn’t come to Washington to make friends. When you speak truth to power, it is not popular to the people who are exposed by that truth. It’s not the Democrats who are offended by my four years in Congress. It’s the RINOs [Republicans in Name Only], the ones who come to Washington to perpetuate their own careers at the expense of their constituents.”

And you’d put the House Speaker in this category?

“Absolutely. I presume he really wants to do conservative things, but that doesn’t translate to courageous conservative actions, so they’re worthless.”

So what’s next for you?

“I honestly don’t know yet. The Bible tells us that we’re to pray for our daily bread. I’d rather have my decade bread and know what I’m going to be doing. And I leave knowing I gave everything I had to try to fight for the things that I believed in. I did what I told my constituents I would do. I ran as a Biblical and constitutional conservative, and I have voted and governed and fought consistently for those things.”

Why did you change your X handle to Bob Good for America?

“It’s funny, because Good for America has existed for years. We had it as a joint fundraising account. It’s really just for fundraising purposes. I’ve got some campaign debt to retire, and I want to keep my options open. We filed paperwork for 2026 in my district, but that was really just because we needed to continue to fundraise and keep those options open. We’ve made no decisions as to what our political or professional future is.”

A spokesperson for Speaker Johnson declined an offer to respond to Rep. Good’s criticism of his leadership at this time.