Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) was banned from international congressional travel for three months following an alcohol incident during a delegation trip to Mexico, Punchbowl News reported on Wednesday.
"During an August trip to Mexico, Crenshaw was having drinks with a group of Mexican officials," reported Punchbowl's Andrew Desiderio. "One Mexican official cracked a crude joke that made a woman present uncomfortable. Crenshaw toasted the remarks."
In September after the trip concluded, Crenshaw met with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and House Intelligence Committee chair Rick Crawford (R-AR), for a "heated" discussion, according to Desiderio, who added that "Crawford banned Crenshaw from traveling as part of his Intelligence Committee duties — a decision that the chair saw as being authorized by the GOP leadership."
This came at a moment when Crenshaw was already at odds with Crawford, disagreeing with his proposed counterintelligence reforms that were ultimately tacked onto the yearly intelligence authorization bill. Crawford in turn was angry Crenshaw did not back his proposal.
According to the report, Crawford actually asked Johnson to strip Crenshaw of his Intelligence Committee assignment altogether after the drinking incident. Johnson did not do so, but did shut down Crenshaw's "cartel task force" within the committee.
All of this is emerging as Crenshaw, who is already disliked by a number of far-right Trump activists even while he tries to maintain a good relationship with the White House, inadvertently undermined the president's justification for military strikes on boats in international waters believed by the administration to be carrying drug traffickers.