Continuing his dramatic entrance, Ryan Zinke, a scandal-ridden former Trump administration official, signaled his return to Congress on Tuesday by misquoting his hero Theodore Roosevelt.
Zinke has long considered himself a conservative in the Roosevelt mold. He has been called “the Roosevelt man” and “unapologetic admirer” of the 26th president, and continues to cling to the Roosevelt-style brand despite the blowback from the Roosevelt family.
During a closed-door GOP meeting Tuesday morning, even before he and others were sworn in as members of the 118th Congress, Zinke read a quote from his hero — or so he thought — while voicing his support for Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.). .) became the chairman of the House of Representatives.
“I’m going to use the words of Teddy Roosevelt. ‘You’re with us or you’re against us,'” Zinke said, according to Politico. “The stakes are too high. I’m with you, Kevin.”
CNN reporter Edward-Isaac Dovere first pointed out Zinke’s flub. HuffPost could find no instance of Roosevelt uttering those words. The phrase is common and difficult to trace back to a single person; However, George W. Bush famously said these words during an anti-terrorism speech shortly after the September 11 terrorist attacks.
Zinke’s campaign did not respond to HuffPost’s request for clarification.
Zinke often calls out and compares himself to Roosevelt. For his first day as head of the Interior, he arrived wearing a 10-gallon cowboy hat and riding a horse named Tonto and pledged to “faithfully uphold Teddy Roosevelt’s belief that the public lands we cherish ‘are for the benefit and enjoyment of the people.’
But the record at the head of the Department of the Interior is in stark contrast to that of the former president. While Roosevelt protected more than 230 million acres of federal land by establishing five national parks, 18 national monuments and dozens of national forests, wildlife refuges and bird reserves, Zinke led the largest reduction of national monuments in American history and played an important role in moving them forward. President Donald Trump’s pro-extraction, anti-conservation agenda.
It is a legacy that conservationists and critics, including Sally Jewel, who led the Department of the Interior under President Barack Obama, said the possibility of leaving Roosevelt “rolling in the grave.” Theodore Roosevelt IV, the president’s grandson, told HuffPost shortly before Zinke’s resignation in late 2018 that Zinke’s “evil angels won.”
MANDEL ONLY via Getty Images
After resigning from the Trump administration amid an ethics scandal in January 2019, Zinke accepted a lucrative gig working as a consultant for fossil fuel interests and other extractive industries responsible for managing them while leading a large federal agency.
A former Navy SEAL, Zinke returned to Congress after defeating Democrat Monica Tranel and Libertarian John Lamb in November to win the race for Montana’s new House seat. He promised to restore what he called “energy dominance” and fight against what he called the “swamp” of bureaucrats in Washington, the “resistance movement” and the “Deep State.” Zinke previously represented Montana as an at-large member of the House of Representatives.
In a Roosevelt-themed campaign ad in February, Zinke declared: “I live by Theodore Roosevelt’s ethos that it’s better to fill a mountain with fire than go around a foxhole. I’ve taken a lot of fire, but I’m not backing down.”