Wednesday on FNC’s “Fox & Friends,” Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) weighed in on why he was primaried as his progressive opponent Jessica Cisneros moves for a recount.
Cuellar argued there was a “far-left” sector of the Democratic Party that was “trying to purify members.” He asserted that those members of the party “don’t understand reality.”
“There is a left sector of our party that feels that the only standard that should be out there is that you should agree with me 100% of the time,” Cuellar outlined. “And that far left is trying to purify members just like the Tea Party did back some years ago against my Republican colleagues. So the fringes are doing this. And in my party, you got the far left that just don’t understand reality.”
“You know, the super-left movement is not good for governance because if you start setting up a circular firing squad and start going after people that you just don’t happen to agree with, that’s not good,” he added. “I always saw the Democratic Party as the big tent party. It’s interesting when you look up the word liberal, a progressive. It talks about looking at diversity. The only thing is some of those progressives don’t believe in diversity of thought and ideas, the marketplace for ideas. And that’s, I think, one of the deficiencies that they need to understand the word progressive.”
Follow Trent Baker on Twitter @MagnifiTrent