I will be the first one to say when I read former Members or former Admin people speak I tend to look the other way because there is typically some sort of underlying issue. When I saw that Former Rep. Dave Trott wrote the article for The Daily Beast I further wanted to ignore it however, The Hill article pulled a lot of quotes that I think most people would be interested in.
In his post it is clear that former GOP Rep. Trott has broken with the Republican Party, I looked into this further and see he has become an independent, over President Trump and his actions. Because of that alone I know roughly half of the population will write off his comments and the other half are going to still ignore them to cheer for the wrong reasons.
He is 110% correct when he says
Members I have kept in touch with are miserable, and the deplorable state of affairs in our Capitol today is certainly a driving factor behind many recent lawmakers’ resignations
and he further highlights the issues facing Lawmakers when he stated
One of the most unfortunate changes in our cultural echo chambers now is that hate and violence is not only expected, but acceptable. Trump’s ability to energize his MAGA base against any Republican who demonstrates independent thinking has only exacerbated this problem, as has the impact of social media (on both sides of the aisle)
Partisanship has long long long existed in the U.S. just like it exists everywhere where people are allowed to have their own thoughts and opinions on things. It has gotten much worse though and the media plays a huge part in fanning flames as we have seen over the years. When Former Rep. Trott talks about his former coworkers he highlights this and even highlights where his shortfall was in his two terms.
Most of my peers were more capable and intelligent than the media portrayed them, although the place was completely dysfunctional. It still is. And it’s gotten worse. More toxic. The focus is on winning—i.e. beating the other party—and playing the blame game, not solving problems. (I was not very good at this game; I got a few bills across the finish line but mostly focused on helping constituents.)
It is going to be an interesting few months as more and more stuff bubbles to the surface with numerous Members facing difficult decisions.