What Will Happen If Congress is Not Doomed? When the Speaker’s Office Fails to a Democratic Speaker: The Case of Scott Perry
Opening day in the House of Representatives is typically marked by the usual pageantry and the fleeting promise that this Congress will work better than the last. That hope could be dashed in a second if the House fails to choose a speaker on the first ballot and then has a floor fight.
If need be, Norman would fight on for six months if necessary to oppose McCarthy in the race for speaker. Despite the tough talk, McCarthy – who rather prematurely took up residence in the speaker’s office suite – is left with painful realities. It seems impossible for him to win over most of the objectors, and this is the reason why his bid is doomed. A few Republicans late Tuesday seemed to be toying with the possibility that another candidate could emerge – after the House turned into a farce and their party was made a laughing stock.
Pennsylvania GOP Rep. Scott Perry, a leading McCarthy critic who signed onto a letter with nine other Republicans circulated on New Year’s day, tweeted: “nothing changes when nothing changes.” He cited the letter which states “the times demand a radical departure from the status quo, not a continuation of the past and ongoing Republican failures.”
The Senate Majority Leader’s Agenda for the First Two-Focusing Days of Jan. 13 – Without a Consensus
There is nothing else to do in the house until a speaker is elected. The only positions mentioned in the constitution are leadership and power.
There have been some discussions about trying to rally around a consensus candidate, but McCarthy’s allies have been pushing what they say is an “O.K. ” strategy — “Only Kevin.” The process may take hours or even days if McCarthy is not able to get some of the hold outs to back him.
Scalise, who is in line to serve as House Majority leader, released an agenda for the first two weeks of January. He pledged the House would vote on measures to cancel the boost in funding to hire more IRS agents, and bills dealing with border security and abortion. The new session is stalling out because the House committees are unable to form, members cannot take the oath of office, and other business is not taking place.
Editor’s Note: Jill Filipovic is a journalist based in New York and author of the book “OK Boomer, Let’s Talk: How My Generation Got Left Behind.” Follow her on the social networking site. The opinions in this commentary are of her own. View more opinion on CNN.
Hakeem Jeffries of New York: What Happened to the Republicans in the First Three Roll Calls of the New House?
Democrats chanted as their new leader, Hakeem Jeffries of New York, achieved more votes than McCarthy in the first three roll calls of the new House.
Voters were not willing to give Republicans the power they needed in November because they were tired of all the tumult of the Trump presidency and were looking for some calm. The GOP did not win back the Senate, despite falling short of a red wave in the House. Farcical scenes in the House on Tuesday were hardly what those voters had in mind in November.
A “furious” Greene was one of the few on the Republican far right to cast her vote for McCarthy. These are people with views extreme enough and divorced enough from reality that they would have once been called “fringe.” How fringe is a view held by so many elected members of Congress?
And McCarthy, who in the early days after the January 6 attack said Trump bore responsibility for it but didn’t support his impeachment, and who helped usher conservative extremists into office and then protect them once there, is experiencing the all-too-predictable outcome of handing power to the unhinged.
He helps to remake his party in the image of Trump. A hallmark of Trumpism was the intentional destruction of the institutions that helped to build trust and functional governance, and the rejection of decency and moderation. His most rabid followers in Congress have followed his lead, embracing this spirit of narcissism and burn-it-all down rage.
That does not bode well for the Republican Party’s ability to govern, and instead suggests that the next two years might be characterized not just by intense partisan divides, but by a profoundly dysfunctional GOP heading into a contentious presidential election.
The Republicans have finally regained some power two years after Donald Trump left the White House.
Even Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, known more for embracing conspiracy theories than stable governance, complained that the party was thwarting its own goals “because 19 Republicans decided to blow up the Speaker’s race.” (Greene backs McCarthy).
On a surreal day, the 118th Congress opened with Republicans fighting Republicans, while Democrats – who should have been mourning their lost majority – were joyous at the GOP circus they beheld.
A daylong debacle, in which McCarthy appeared to have no strategy other than a beat-the-head-against-a-brick-wall approach, ended in a limbo. Family members dressed nicely but bored at the sight of their new lawmakers sworn in were disappointed. The House adjourned and will resume on Wednesday at noon, even though there’s little sign the deadlock will break.
“I didn’t think we were going to get any more productive by continuing on the day,” McCarthy told reporters late Tuesday. He insisted he wouldn’t be dropping out of the race.
He implied that he could get some members to vote present, which would lower the threshold he would need to win.
The War of the Republicans: Reopening the Role of the Caucus on the House Floor in Replacing the Ex-President Paul Ryan
— The GOP civil war, which erupted with the Tea Party backlash to the Obama administration, is far from burned out. It was responsible for the departures of Republican House Speakers Paul Ryan and John Boehner and was put into overdrive by Trump. And as soon as the party had a sniff of power again, that strife burst into the open as radicals seek to destroy a party establishment that has already shifted far right to appease them.
“Maybe the right person for the speaker of the House isn’t someone who has sold shares in himself for more than a decade to get it,” Gaetz said on the floor on Tuesday in a cutting jab at McCarthy, who sat a few feet away.
The lawmakers who voted to impeach Trump were defeated by a competitor backed by the ex-president, who eventually lost the general election to a Democrat according to Beutler.
Democrats are trying to make political capital out of it so they can make a case that Republicans will be kicked out at the first opportunity in the next election. Jeffries told Democratic donors he watched House Republicans plunge into chaos on the floor. “This changes everything for Democrats. We have a chance to take over and show what we can do.
McCarthy got weaker with each roll call even if one senior GOP source told CNN that they were going to war. Some GOP members are now referring to the rebels as “the chaos caucus” or “The Taliban 20,” CNN’s Manu Raju reported.
McCarthy will get a fresh chance on Wednesday to show that he can bring his conference under control and finally bring some order to the new Republican majority – even if the path ahead remains impossible to identify. Perhaps a day of infighting will convince all Republicans they are at risk of squandering their majority.
“We have an agenda and we want to implement that agenda and we can either be the conference who comes together to do that or we can let a select few keep us from being able to do that,” Utah Republican Rep. Blake Moore told CNN’s Erin Burnett on Tuesday, arguing that McCarthy had been successful in leading his party back to power in the House.
Hazeem Jeffries’s History First Black Party Leader: What he wants to do with the next 2023 Black Hole Crisis
In 2019, he became chairman of the Democratic caucus, making him the youngest member serving in leadership. Jeffries was also part of a select group of lawmakers who were impeachment managers during the Senate trial of then-President Donald Trump.
Jeffries graduated with a masters degree in public policy from Georgetown University after studying politics at the State University of New York at Binghamton. He also attended law school at New York University School of Law where he was on the law review.
He was elected to New York’s Assembly in 2006 and began his career in politics. He was elected to the New York 8th congressional district, which includesBrooklyn and Queens.
During his time in Congress, Jeffries has pushed for policing reform, including a national ban on chokeholds following the death of Eric Garner, a Black man who died in 2014 after being held in the restraining move. The First Step Act and the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act were co-sponsored by him but failed in the Senate.
Jeffries, who was first elected in 2012, will embark on his sixth term with ambitions to restore the enhanced child tax credit, get his party back to the majority in 2024, call out what he describes as Republican extremism and rebuild economic access.
He told CNN last month that he was looking forward to the chance to do the best for the greatest number of people possible, and that he could operate at the highest level.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/04/politics/hakeem-jeffries-history-first-black-party-leader/index.html
The Capitol Building: The Birthplace of Black History and the First Black Presidential Advancing President, Jeffries Ascent to the White House
Jeffries ascension as one of the highest-ranking Black politicians ever in America comes as a record number of Black people assume their role in Congress. The building where the foundation was laid by slaves was the location where they will navigate the Capitol.