Anyone who’s paying attention has noticed the pattern by now: “principled” Republicans sell out their own side, then get rewarded by Democrats and the corporate media.
For years now, the poster child for this grift has been James Comey — the FBI director (and longtime Republican) who turned on President Trump and cashed in with book deals, TV appearances, and even a miniseries on Showtime.
Plenty of former Trump officials have followed in his footsteps, including Cassidy Hutchinson, Alyssa Farah Griffin, John Bolton, and former Defense Secretary Mark Esper.
The latest Republican to take a principled stance against Trump (that just happens to turn him into a media darling) is Roger Alford, the man a Justice Department spokesperson just described as “the James Comey of antitrust.”
Alford is a former DOJ antitrust official who tried to undermine Trump’s agenda, got fired, and is being rebranded by the left as a conservative with a conscience.
Different arenas, same strategy: betray your team, cozy up to the Democrats, and bask in hagiographic media coverage, generous speaking fees, and a hefty book advance.
Comey defied the president, leaked his own notes, and lit the fuse for the Mueller witch hunt.
Alford defied his superiors, tried to block a merger that U.S. intelligence said was vital for national security, and then gave a speech smearing his own DOJ colleagues as corrupt.
In that same speech, he also compared himself to both the 16th-century martyr St. Thomas More and the protagonists of The Lord of the Rings. He told the crowd that after being fired from the administration, going back to his old teaching job at Notre Dame’s law school felt like “return[ing] to the Shire after fighting the Orcs in the Battle of Helm’s Deep.”
If he’d bothered to fact-check his own speech draft, Alford might have realized that Tolkien’s hobbits don’t return home after the early victory at Helm’s Deep, but only after the war ends with the destruction of the One Ring.
Perhaps Alford read a different version of the story in which Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin abandon their quest halfway through, return to the Shire, tell their war stories to admiring tavern crowds, and spread nasty rumors about Aragorn while Suron’s orcs burn and enslave Middle Earth.
That would certainly bear a closer resemblance to Alford’s actions. He walked away from the Trump administration before the end of the fight and settled back into the comfortable halls of academia, where glowing media profiles quickly replaced the hard duty of governing.
Imagine if Sam Gamgee had told Frodo on the slopes of Mount Doom, “Actually, I think we’ve gone far enough. Let’s turn back, crack open an ale, and give a speech about how noble we were.” That would’ve been desertion, not heroism. Yet that’s essentially the role Alford just played: quitting on the mission, then basking in applause from the very people rooting against the success of the Trump agenda.
Both Alford and Comey thought they knew better than elected leadership and were perfectly willing to undermine the administration’s goals and subvert the will of the voters.
Comey became a Resistance folk hero, paraded on CNN and MSNBC, lionized by the same Democrats he once investigated.
Alford is being showered with praise by progressive antitrust activists and liberal outlets for “standing up” to Trump’s DOJ.
It’s the same routine: undermine Republicans, and the left will make sure you land softly.
Comey loved the cameras, constantly posturing as “the last honest man in Washington” while tearing down the president he was supposed to serve.
Alford is copying the script, puffing himself up as a whistleblower when really he was fired for plain old insubordination.
Both cloak their betrayal in lofty language about “principle” while putting self-interest and ego first. And both are more than willing to push the left’s agenda to advance that self-interest.
Comey gave Democrats the talking points they used to keep the Russia hoax alive for years.
Alford is now pouring gasoline on the latest Democratic attempt to manufacture a major Trump “scandal” out of nothing — one that Corey Booker, Amy Klobuchar, and Elizabeth Warren have already capitalized on without blinking an eye.
And that's what really matters. It’s not just about Alford’s ego or Comey’s vanity. It’s that this pattern actively weakens the Republican Party and, by extension, the voters who elected Trump to carry out an agenda. Every time one of these so-called “principled Republicans” defects, the media cheers, the Democrats get new ammunition, and ordinary Americans get stuck with the fallout.
Whenever one of these so-called Republicans flips, he gets richer, the left gets stronger, and America gets the shaft.
Neither Comey nor Alford is a hero. They’re opportunists who abandoned their posts to score points with the mainstream media and people trying to destroy our movement.
Alford may pretend he’s writing a new chapter in the “principled Republican” story, but he’s just recycling the Comey playbook.
Democrats might gobble it up, but Republicans are done falling for it.
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