I have written before about Democratic congressman Dan Lipinski, easily one of the worst Democrats in Congress, who occupies a seat that he ‘inherited’ from his father when the latter stepped aside to make room for him. In the 2018 election, he was challenged in the primary by a much better candidate Marie Newman but the Republican-lite Democratic party leadership threw its weight behind Lipinski even though Lipinski is pretty much opposed to everything that the Democratic party claims to represent.

This was even though there was no risk to the party because Newman would have won easily if she had been the nominee because that seat is one of the safest Democratic seats in Congress. Lipinski narrowly beat Newman by just two percentage points, thanks to last-minute money that poured in from the quasi-Republican ‘No Labels’ group.

And true to form, the anti-LGBT, misogynistic Lipinski is against progressive measures that the party overwhelmingly supports. He is the only Democratic representative in the House to not sign on as a cosponsor of the Equality Act that was introduced this week that would ban discrimination against the LGBT community. Lipinski cites his religious beliefs as the reason. In the Senate, Joe Manchin of West Virginia is the only Democrat to not co-sponsor the bill.

Newman plans to run against Lipinski again in 2020 and one hopes that the last of the Blue Dog Democrats gets his clock cleaned.