Establishment Fail: Jeb Bush’s Chief Technology Officer Resigns

AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee, File
AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee, File

That was quick.

On Tuesday evening, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush’s chief technology officer resigned just days after joining Bush’s Right to Rise political action committee.

Ethan Czahor, the co-founder of Hipster.com, joined Bush’s organization this week to run his campaign’s technology operation. But immediately after his hiring was announced, Czahor had to delete a series of Tweets in which he referred to women as “sluts” and mocked gays. He also reportedly praised Martin Luther King for not having his “pants sagged to his ankles” and for avoiding “slang” and “jibberish.”
A Bush spokesperson reportedly said Bush’s PAC accepted Czahor’s resignation on Tuesday.
“While Ethan has apologized for regrettable and insensitive comments, they do not reflect the views of Governor Bush or his organization and it is appropriate for him to step aside. We wish him the best,” the spokesperson said.
This fiasco shines another light on how establishment Republican candidates who mock conservatives for their supposed lack of organization (see: Jon Huntsman in 2012) are hardly the most organized.
The mainstream media and the Republican establishment incessantly denigrate conservatives and Tea Party candidates for various snafus. They want to find any excuse to paint conservatives as racists, sexists, and homophobes. But Bush’s establishment organization could not even vet 100 Tweets from the person who would briefly become their chief technology officer. Those since-deleted Tweets only perpetuated stereotypes about Republicans that the mainstream press love to use against GOP candidates.
There were concerns that Bush, who has not campaigned in more than a decade, would not be ready for a modern campaign in the digital age much like the Clintons weren’t in 2008. The velocity at which information travels and controversies flare up now is much more rapid than when Bush last ran for reelection in Florida. Some wondered if Bush would be like a high school star football player forced to play at NFL speed. His top advisers like Mike Murphy, though, assured reporters that Bush and his team would hit the ground running and be fully up to speed.
Czahor’s abrupt resignation hardly gives voters confidence that Team Bush can run a modern campaign and avoid many of the traps that did not exist a decade ago.

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