Letters to the Editor: Why would any Republican be surprised by Virginia Thomas' coup plotting?

To the editor: I applaud Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) for having a "red line" he wouldn't cross and for his work on the House Jan. 6 committee. However, if his "biggest personal shock" was the extensive involvement of Virginia Thomas in supporting the insurrection, he wasn't paying close enough attention.

He was in the House in 2013 when Thomas started Groundswell, a conservative group with plans for a 30-front war seeking to fundamentally transform the nation and fight progressivism.

Thomas' group pressured then-House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and then-House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, a Southern California Republican, to continue the Benghazi committee's investigation and pursuit of Hillary Clinton long past any useful purpose to try to discredit her in time for the 2016 election. The group threatened to stop financial support for anyone who didn't go along with her demands.

Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Bakersfield) bragged on Fox News that the Benghazi committee's work was meant to weaken Clinton as a presidential candidate.

Thomas has never felt any need to hide her political efforts, and somehow she keeps getting away with it.

Gaylon Monteverde, Camarillo

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To the editor: Kinzinger, the former soldier who might have seemed like someone who would never have to worry about finding a place to call home or regret any ill-thought votes, may benefit on his lonely walk into a quite unknown future by heeding these words once spoken by Thucydides, the great Athenian historian and military general:

"The secret to happiness is freedom. And the secret to freedom is courage."

Mary Stanik, Tucson

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.