Reply to McCarthy’s “Cosmology for a Reason”: Sensitivities to the Biden-era Pandemic Emergency Rule to the Middle East

McCarthy received applause from his colleagues at the private meeting. McCarthy promised that he would strip away power from Democrats, saying, if elected, he would kick Minnesota Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar off the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and California Reps. Eric Swalwell and Adam Schiff off the House Intelligence Committee, according to a source in the room. He made clear his role in bringing back Republicans to power.

The Biden administration continues to rely on a Trump-era pandemic emergency rule, known as Title 42, that allows border authorities to turn migrants away at the US-Mexico border. In fiscal year 2022, US border encounters reached 2 million, amid mass migration in the Western hemisphere. More than 1 million were turned away.

“We will never use impeachment for political purposes,” McCarthy said. If the event rises to the occasion, it would be used at any other time.

And with the MAGA-wing calling to cut off funding to Ukraine while the GOP’s defense hawks vow not to abandon the country amid its war with Russia, McCarthy attempted to reaffirm his support for Ukraine while saying they would not automatically rubber stamp any additional requests for aid.

The comments McCarthy made last week at a press conference are just the most recent sign of how McCarthy is going to try and convince conservatives to vote for him for speaker.

Biggs, who secured 31 votes when he lost the GOP nomination for speaker against McCarthy last month, has told CNN he’s “not bluffing” and plans to run for speaker when the full House votes next month. Critics claim there are more than five people who oppose McCarthy who haven’t made their position known.

Why can Mexicans stay in Mexico? Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has the power to get out of the debt crisis and not to lose his job

“I think ‘Stay in Mexico’ you have to have right off the bat,” he said, referring to the controversial policy where migrants were forced to remain in Mexico while they wait for their immigration proceedings in the United States.

To help stem the flow of fentanyl coming across the border, McCarthy said “you first do a very frontal attack on China to stop the poison from coming,” and then “provide the resources that the border agents need” and “make sure that fentanyl anytime anybody who wants to move it, you can prosecute him for the death penalty.”

The majority of the bills will be primarily messaging efforts that are not likely to pass the Senate or the presidency, though they could possibly raise the national borrowing limit at some point next year. McCarthy, however, signaled Republicans will demand spending cuts in exchange for lifting the debt ceiling, teeing up a risky fiscal showdown that could lead to a disastrous debt default.

“If you’re going to give a person a higher limit, wouldn’t you first say you should change your behavior, so you just don’t keep raising and all the time?” He said something about it. “You shouldn’t just say, ‘Oh, I’m gonna let you keep spending money.’ No household should do that.”

McCarthy acknowledged Republicans were willing to raise the debt ceiling under Trump, but said the calculus is different now because Democrats spent trillions of dollars under Biden.

McCarthy denied that he would risk a default by using the debt ceiling as a bargaining chip. You don’t risk being in a position of default.

McCarthy intends to bring back the committee assignments of freshman Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, despite her being demoted by Democrats last year for her inflammatory remarks.

When asked if he has any restrictions about which committees Greene can serve, McCarthy – who will have a direct say in doling out those assignments – said “no.” She has previously stated that she wants to sit on the House Oversight Committee in order to have a larger say in GOP investigations in a majority.

She will have committees just like every other member. He said members request different committees and that they would consider it as they went through the steering committee. “She can put through the committees she wants, just like any other member in our conference that gets elected.”

Greene is not the only member who has spouted conspiracy theories or incendiary rhetoric. Most recently, some Republicans have mocked the brutal attack on Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi, or peddled fringe conspiracy theories about the incident.

The Five Families: The Challenge that a Representative of the House Republican Party Can Aspire to: Democrat Rep. Lauren Boebert and the House Freedom Caucus

“The first thing I’ll ask the president to do is not to call half the nation idiots or say things about them because they have a difference of opinion,” he said. I think the leader of the nation starts with the president. And it will start with the speaker as well.”

The House Freedom Caucus needs to have a real discussion about whether he should be the speaker, according to one of their members. “I think we should have a very frank discussion internally about where we’re going to be going forward.”

The Freedom Caucus isn’t united on whether to make it a hard line for Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado, who said it was a red line.

The Freedom Caucus, a group made of many hardline members, has been in Washington, DC this week for their new member orientation, where they have begun planning their strategy for the speaker’s race. With a slimmer-than-expected majority, they see an opportunity, and are planning to use their leverage to get more power in a GOP-led House.

McCarthy talked with the so-called “Five Families,” who represent the various ideological groups in the House GOP. The California Republican outlined some of the demands from the right he was willing to give in to, such as establishing a broad investigative panel to centralize probes into the Biden administration.

CNN has yet to project which party will have a majority in the House, but as of Friday morning, CNN projected Republicans had 211 seats to Democrats’ 198.

The C-Team: Defending President Donald J. McConnell and the Case for a Delay in the House Leadership Elections

The group hopes to make a longer list of the rules changes they are seeking. They are also pushing to delay next week’s internal leadership elections, though there is no indication McCarthy plans to do so.

When asked whether McCarthy should get credit for delivering the majority, Norman responded: “The taxpayers that voted the representatives in deserve the credit.”

Gaetz, who is one of the five hard no votes, said on the call he wouldn’t back McCarthy despite all the demands he has made. The group of nine hardliners sent a letter saying that some of McCarthy’s concessions are insufficient, and that progress is being made.

With a slim majority, we shouldn’t be starting the C team. It’s vital that our star players are put in a position to shine bright so that we can attract more people to our policies and ideas.

House and Senate Republicans are gearing up for a tense series of closed-door meetings this week as the GOP grapples with what went wrong in the midterms and decides the political fate of its current leaders, who are under fire following last week’s disappointing election results.

A small group of GOP senators want their leadership elections delayed so that they can have a discussion about why the GOP didn’t do as well. And at least one Republican, Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, has publicly vowed to oppose McConnell’s bid for GOP leader.

CNN reported Sunday that Rep. Andy Biggs of Arizona, a former chairman of the pro-Trump House Freedom Caucus, is considering mounting a long-shot challenge to McCarthy, according to GOP sources familiar with the matter. McCarthy’s team is prepared for this possibility.

Rick Scott, the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, called for a delay in the Senate leadership election, saying it didn’t make sense.

What are our plans, what should we do? What would we stand for? Scott said Sunday on Fox News. The Republicans are going to run against how bad the Democrats are because the leadership in the Senate says you can’t have a plan. They cave into the Democrats. Now they want to rush through an election. We are not done with what happened in Georgia.

Meanwhile, Trump aides and allies have been privately critical of Tom Emmer, head of the National Republican Congressional Committee, amid the GOP’s underwhelming midterm gains, especially on the House side. CNN has not yet projected which party will control the lower chamber, though Republicans appear on track to gain a narrow House majority. Emmer is competing against Rep. Jim Banks, an ally of Donald Trump Jr., for the position of House GOP whip.

“They’ve been measuring the draperies, they’ve been putting forth an agenda. They haven’t won it yet,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi told CNN’s “State of the Union.” If the election is close, there will be judgements made about how we are going forward in our own parties.

Behind the scenes, the finger pointing has begun, and those conversations are likely to accelerate when the full House and Senate return to Washington this week.

Trump and his allies have tried to make McConnell the fall guy for the GOP’s lackluster midterm performance, accusing McConnell of spending recklessly in states where Republicans faced significant headwinds at the expense of candidates in more competitive contests.

“There’s a very high correlation between MAGA candidates and big losses,” said retiring Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Pat Toomey. It is likely that the party is not going to do well if it chooses candidates who are fealty to Donald Trump.

McConnell and Scott have also been publicly at odds all election cycle when it comes to strategy, with McConnell sounding the alarm about candidate quality while Scott opted to take a hands-off approach in the primaries.

Even though he had little chance of succeeding, Scott still didn’t rule out challenging McConnell for the top spot.

“Well, we’re still continuing to talk, but they have not moved,” McCarthy told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt. “And the difficulty here is that you know, we are the only Republican entity stopping the Biden administration. We will be the only ones that can move forward. But it would delay everything, getting committees up and running, being able to do the things that you know we need to get done from the very beginning.”

A senior Republican told CNN that basic political physics says you can’t appease the moderates and HFC at the same time. If you straddle that fence, you better be sure it is not barbed wire.

It was unclear if Mr. McCarthy enlisted Mr. Trump to help his campaign or if he was doing it on his own. The former president has spoken with Eli Crane, an incoming Republican congressman from Arizona, and Representative Ralph Norman, Republican of South Carolina, among others. Mr. Crane and Mr. Norman were part of a group of seven current and incoming Republican lawmakers who signed a letter with a list of concessions they are demanding from their leaders in the next Congress, including making it easier to force a vote to remove the speaker — something that Mr. McCarthy has so far resisted.

More context: Trump has been eager to lock up public support from Republicans for his third presidential bid, with a separate GOP source saying he has been asking to see which GOP lawmakers have endorsed him in the media.

The Speaker of the House, John Pelosi: Elections, Reports, and Standing Order on the House Minority Leader’s Spot

The speaker of the House would be whoever is elected for the top leadership spot in the caucus. But if Republicans have a majority, that nominee would be expected to fall short in the vote by the full House in the Speaker’s election in January and would be poised to become House Minority Leader instead.

If Pelosi decides to run again for the top leadership spot for House Democrats, it will make clear that she is not yet ready to relinquish her role atop the House Democratic caucus. Pelosi, a towering figure in Democratic politics, commands widespread support among her members and is viewed as an effective leader within her party.

The republicans are scheduled to have a candidate forum on Monday, followed by leadership elections on Tuesday, according to a copy of the schedule shared with CNN.

The first election on November 30 will be for the next House Democratic Caucus Chair and whoever is elected to that role will administer the rest of the leadership elections.

To be elected to any position in Democratic leadership, a candidate needs to win a majority among those present and voting. If two or more candidates run and there isn’t a majority, the least votes cast will be eliminated and the second round of voting will take place. That process continues until a certain candidate gets the majority.

He has resisted making deals to weaken the speakership if enough Freedom Caucus members don’t support him.

Emmer told reporters that he doesn’t know if a smaller majority will affect his bid. But his pitch to members is similar to McCarthy’s, saying: “we delivered.”

Emmer is running against Reps. Jim Banks of Indiana, the Republican Study Committee chair, and Drew Ferguson of Georgia, the chief deputy Whip, for the post.

Hakeem Jeffries, the House Democratic Caucus Chair, and Sen. Scalise, who criticized D.C. Jail Treatment of the Jan. 6 Capitol Attack

“Of course. The California Democrat said that people are campaigning and that is a beautiful thing. I don’t want anyone to give me anything. My members are asking me to do that. But, again, let’s just get through the election.”

2 House Democrat, in the role of House majority leader. Hakeem Jeffries is the House Democratic caucus chair.

Colorado democrat Joe Neguse, who co-chair of the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee, will run for caucus chair to replace Jeffries who is term limited.

The race to head the campaign arm of the party, the DCUC, is beginning to shape up after the current head lost his reelection.

The Democratic congressman from California said on Friday he would run for the spot, but others are also in the running.

Members of the Freedom Caucus met with McCarthy in his office on Monday to try and get concessions from him in exchange for their speaker votes.

Bob Good, who said McCarthy faces an uphill climb to the speakership, said they asked McCarthy to bring up his proposal for running the House.

The primary focus of the group has been to seek rules changes that would help individual members and weaken the speaker, but that’s not the limit of their issues.

He said that they would like to see the place change dramatically to reflect the will of the people and acknowledge how broken it is. It’s incumbent on anyone that wants to lead to laying out their vision how they would change their portion of it.

But hard-right Republicans seized the opportunity to extract promises — and in some cases apologies — from their would-be leaders. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, who has said she will support Mr. McCarthy and predicted he would give her a significant amount of power in a Republican-led House, asked Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the party’s No. 2, whether he would commit to investigating Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the Justice Department for their treatment of defendants being held at the D.C. jail without bail in connection with the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

The congressman told CNN that he wouldn’t get into speculation. “Obviously, our focus is on getting it resolved by January 3. The members who have expressed concerns have had a lot of conversations with everybody.

During the exchange, Mr. Clase apologized and told him he should wait until he had more information, according to two people familiar with the exchange who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The Tea Party of Kevin McCarthy and the Implications of the Jan. 6 Outburst for the Congressional Majority Whist and for Same-Sex Marriage

The turmoil underscored how Republicans were toiling to find a path forward after disappointing midterm results, and still grappling with the influence of Mr. Trump and his election lies on their party, including the fallout from the Jan. 6 attack. As Mr. Trump has received an unusual torrent of blame for the string of losses by candidates he had handpicked, Mike Pence made his most brutal comments yet about Mr. Trump.

Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma said it was going to be a narrow one. “It makes it really critical that you’ve got somebody with superb political skills. Somebody that knows every part of this conference.”

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is hoping to pass a crucial test on Tuesday in his campaign to become House speaker despite an underwhelming midterm election performance that launched a search among conservatives for a challenger.

Idaho GOP Rep. Mike Simpson said he’ll support McCarthy for leader, noting the GOP gained House seats the last two elections. Simpson said that he had done a good job.

McCarthy has warned his critics that if they don’t unify, the Democrats could get together and peel off a few Republicans to get the next speaker.

Bob Good complained to the room that McCarthy did not call to congratulate him when he won the primary because he thought the Super PAC that supported McCarthy opposed some pro-Trump candidates. McCarthy directed $2 million to Good for his race. The source said that good had to be given down to cut him off so they could focus on the next question.

But McCarthy’s allies have recently attempted to convince moderate Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar to switch parties in hopes of padding their slim margins, according to two sources familiar with the conversation. Cuellar flatly rejected the idea. McCarthy was not involved in the discussions if they took place, and this is not a part of his speakership bid, said his spokesman.

Still, McCarthy and Scalise appear to be in command of their leadership races, while the No. 3 House GOP position remains up for grabs, which would be the role of House majority whip, if Republicans win control of the chamber.

At the private forum, Minnesota Rep. Tom Emmer, the National Republican Congressional Committee chair, was pressed on his vote in support of a bill to codify same-sex marriage earlier this year, according to a source in the room. He said divisive social issues shouldn’t be on the House floor.

Some pro-McCarthy Republicans are signaling support for a different approach if McCarthy or Biggs need the votes of 218 colleagues to get a majority on January 3. Some said they would be willing to work with Democrats to find a moderate Republican who can get the 218 votes to clinch the gavel – a long-shot idea that underscores the uncertainty looming over the speaker’s race.

Teams win. The Main Street Caucus co-chairman told CNN that the fractured teams lose and that McCarthy had the full support of the conference. “We can’t let a handful hold the conference hostage.”

You would have good people running, if Kevin removed his name from the race. Scalise would probably be the guy,” one GOP lawmaker said.

If the GOP leader can’t get the votes, Scalise will support McCarthy and not speculate on whether he would jump into the race.

Rep. Jim Jordan, the conservative set to become the chair of the House Judiciary Committee, went even further, ruling out jumping into the race even though Gaetz and other hardliners have urged him to seek the speakership.

After leaving a meeting with McCarthy in his office on Wednesday, Norman said that he will vote for Andy for speaker. He later added: “All this is positive. We are having good change even if there is something happening. You will see more of it.

In addition to those five, a new group of seven Republican hardliners on Thursday laid out a list of conditions to earn their vote but did not threaten to vote against McCarthy if their demands aren’t met.

The rules package for the 118th congress was unveiled on Sunday evening and it codifies some of the concessions that McCarthy has agreed to. There is a chance that there could be more compromises made in the coming days because of the Speaker’s inability to lock down a speaker.

The California Republican had told his members in Sunday’s call that after weeks of negotiations, he has agreed to a threshold as low as five people to trigger a vote on ousting the speaker at any given time, known as the “motion to vacate” the speaker’s chair, and pitched it as a “compromise.” CNN reported last week he was supportive of that threshold.

The idea that people are sick and tired of noise and fighting is what caused a red wave, according to an Ohio Republican. “And I know I get that wherever I go in my district is, ‘why can’t you guys just get things done?’”

McCarthy delayed GOP internal elections for committee chairmanships as he scrambles to lock down speaker’s votes. It was speculated that one of the members in the race for the gavel, Rep. Vern Buchanan of Florida, may retire early if he doesn’t win. Buchanan strongly disagreed with the notion.

Some Democrats have said they would entertain the idea, including Rep. Henry Cuellar, a moderate Democrat from Texas who told CNN some of his GOP colleagues have approached him “informally” about it.

Some of the members have made contact with him, but he didn’t want to run. “At the end of the day, Kevin’s going to be the new speaker.”

New York Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, the next House Democratic leader, said, “there are no behind-the-scenes conversations” that he has had with Republicans to put up an alternative candidate. But he refused to rule out a scenario where his caucus would help elect the next speaker if McCarthy couldn’t get the votes.

Jeffries told CNN that Democrats were in the midst of organizing the conference. The GOP is in the process of organizing the conference. On January 3, let’s see what happens.

Some of the potential consensus picks that have been floated included retiring Reps. Fred Upton of Michigan and John Katko of New York, who both voted to impeach Donald Trump for inciting the Capitol insurrection; Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, co-chair of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus; and Oklahoma Rep. Tom Cole, a veteran lawmaker and incoming head of the House Rules Committee.

But that would require agreement from every single Democrat and the help of five Republicans – no easy feat. Upton said he has no plans to be in Washington that day, telling CNN: “I’ll be skiing.”

Minority Democrats in the Arkansas legislature banded together to elected a GOP speaker of their choosing, said Bruce Westerman who is a Republican. Westerman privately made this case to his colleagues at a closed-door meeting this week.

A Conversation with Westerman and a Republican Lobbyist: Is There a Plan to Protect the House Rules Against Decruption?

Westerman is concerned about the fact that we aren’t able to form a congress and organize committees before January 3, so we won’t push their policy objectives.

The discussion over changing House rules is good for the party according to Westerman. But he added: “I’m not really excited about any type of destructive movement.”

If Mr. McCarthy does have a plan, he has not shared it with members of his leadership team, whom he has cut out of his deliberations about the speakership race in what some regard as a display of paranoia. Instead, he has been spotted in recent days around the Capitol and the Republican National Committee headquarters nearby with Jeff Miller, a Republican lobbyist who is among his closest confidants.

Mr. Norman, who has described himself as a “hard no” against Mr. McCarthy, declined to discuss his call with Mr. Trump, describing it as a “private conversation.” He said he was not sure who he would support for speaker. There were no responses from Mr. Crane to the requests for comment.

When Nancy Pelosi in 2018 found herself about a dozen votes short of what she would need to secure the speaker’s gavel, she quietly picked off defectors, methodically cutting deals to capture exactly enough support to prevail. Ms. Pelosi won all but one of the votes by agreeing to limit her tenure and also by promising to create a subcommittee chairmanship for herself, which led to her winning over her lone would be challenger.

The California Republican has already made a series of pledges in an effort to appease the right flank of his party. He traveled to the southern border and called on Alejandro N. Mayorkas, the homeland security secretary, to resign or face potential impeachment proceedings. He promised she would be a spot on the Oversight Committee, since she was stripped of her committee assignments because of her conspiratorial social media posts.

He has threatened to investigate the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack at the Capitol, promising to hold public hearings scrutinizing the security breakdowns that occurred. He has been in touch with the ultraconservatives to try to convince them. On Monday night, he publicly encouraged his members to vote against the spending bill.

On the failure of Congress to fund the government a year after the Capitol insurrection: comment on a Californian congresswoman on CNN’s Manu Raju

It would be a disaster for any party in American history to have a governing mandate after the tiny GOP House majority takes over in January. The ideological struggle being waged by pro-Donald Trump Extremists inside the party would have made the majority more volatile.

The Republican from California is in a fight with members who want to make it easier to oust a speaker and with members who support ex- President Donald Trump.

McCarthy gave a pass on her attempts to mock the trauma of the Capitol insurrection, when he saw that she was trying to get the speakership. The congresswoman had said over the weekend that had she been in charge on January 6, 2021, the riot would have succeeded and the mob would have been armed. She later insisted she was being sarcastic after the White House complained her comments were a “slap in the face” to law enforcement and against fundamental US values.

This is one reason why the current year-end tussle over whether to fund the government for a full year – a bipartisan framework agreement for which was announced Tuesday night – or for just a few months is so critical since it could dump a fiscal crisis on the lap of a weak and easily manipulated new speaker next month.

Asked by CNN’s Manu Raju on Tuesday about Greene’s latest inflammatory comments, McCarthy shrugged them off: “Oh, I think she said she was being facetious,” the possible future speaker answered. His attitude was predictable as he attempts to rewrite the history of the worst attack on US democracy in modern times, for which he briefly said Trump bore responsibility.

The same dynamic was at play when McCarthy declined to directly criticize the ex-president for meeting with white supremacist Nick Fuentes at a dinner also featuring Kanye West, the rapper now known as Ye, who has recently made a string of antisemitic remarks. House Republican leader made up a story about Trump condemning the same person four different times, when he hadn’t done so before.

CNN’s Raju and Melanie Zanona reported Tuesday that McCarthy had signaled at the White House meeting that he’d be open to a large bill. But while Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell worked on such a measure Tuesday and declared it “broadly appealing,” McCarthy told his members that he was a “Hell no” on the measure.

It raises the chance that it will become politically more difficult for some Republican senators to vote for a spending deal now, as conservative media has taken up McCarthy’s line.

As frustration inside the House GOP has grown over a small band of anti-Kevin McCarthy lawmakers, an idea to strike back at the rebellious group has been floated among some Republicans: kicking these members off their committees, according to multiple members involved in the conversations.

The dynamic shows a preview of the tension between the moderate and MAGA wings that will spill over into next year with a slim majority in the House. Part of what’s fueling the divide: House Republicans who identify as either centrist or part of the GOP’s so-called governing wing feel validated following a midterm cycle in which many extremists candidates failed.

Nancy Mace, a South Carolina Republican, stated that people need to recognize that we don’t need to double down on failed policies. “There’s a reason the midterms were the way that they were: people who are left of center, right of center were the most successful.”

The reality of a narrowly divided House was acknowledged by GOP Rep. Gaetz, who came out in opposition to McCarthy as speaker.

He told CNN that they were in a community of fate. The ship is not going anywhere because five people won’t row in that direction. It is true on impeachment, on the speakership vote, on budget and on policy choices.

What guarantees are going to be made, what concessions are going to be made are some of the unanswered questions. Womack asked. “We got to be careful that we don’t give a lot of that leverage away.”

Burcht, Moore, and the five anti-McCarthy Republicans in the House Freedom Caucus: When the next Congress starts rolling

In the latest in a series of meetings ahead of a new Congress, McCarthy allowed his members to debate rules changes and other concessions even though there is no resolution on the controversial motion to relocate the chair.

At this point many members are still preaching unity, calling the private deal-making part of the process, and emphasizing that the conference will come together when the new Congress begins January 3. To that end, the Republican Governance Group recently sent a letter urging their colleagues to unite behind McCarthy.

“It shouldn’t be a surprise that Republicans are out there having conversations and talking about different points of view,” GOP Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart of Florida told CNN.

Even amid the high-stakes negotiations, members from competing factions have had time to have some fun with one another. Burchett hosted a Christmas party in his office this week, where all corners of Capitol Hill came together, including some anti-McCarthy lawmakers. During a visit to the Mountain Dew fountain, which is filled with Mountain Dew, and with the barbecue plate, which is filled with Ritz crackers, Burchett was able to ride the skateboard of Gaetz’s wife.

Rep. Blake Moore, a Utah Republican who identifies himself as part of the governing wing, said at the end of the day, the various factions actually agree on most things and dismissed the idea it would be tense next year.

“I’ve said this over and over again: there is not this, like, enormous amount of drama,” Moore told CNN. I talked with members of the House Freedom Caucus about what we agreed on. And it’s an enormous amount.”

McCarthy warned that House Republicans would be hard-hit if the five conservative holdouts didn’t change their minds.

McCarthy’s dire warning comes as the five GOP members – Gaetz, Reps. Andy Biggs of Arizona, Ralph Norman of South Carolina, Bob Good of Virginia and Matt Rosendale of Montana – have warned they may vote as a bloc on January 3, meaning they’ll all vote the same way.

McCarthy said this is a presidential year and that you only have a few months to govern. You want to hit the ground running. You don’t start strong when you lose a quarter. New and stronger candidates are not available. You don’t have enough resources to supply them with the message in order to get elected.

I am friendly with a bunch of people who are against Kevin. I believe that almost every one of them is in favor of Trump. I have to tell them, and I have told them, you are playing a very dangerous game. You could be in some very bad situations. I use the Paul Ryan example. You understand what I’m saying? It could be a doomsday scenario.”

The former president cited the scenario from 2015, when then-House Speaker John Boehner resigned after clashes with conservative GOP hard-liners and was then replaced by Paul Ryan.

McCarthy took to the radio to argue that the detractors threaten to put the entire House Republican agenda in peril and basic decisions about legislating will be in jeopardy if they are not stopped.

Delving into “GOP dysfunction since Election Day,” the editorial board said, “Republicans are the gang that couldn’t shoot straight – except at one another.”

“Right now, the emotions are high,” he said. “We’re running up against a holiday, trying to deal with this issue of funding the government and there are different opinions about how best to do that. I get that. I think it will get done. and I think it will set the stage for next year and it seems to be at least in the House next year, that would be an advantage for them. They will start with a clean slate.

“We’re enduring the silly season of a campaign. For most of us, that’s over after you get elected. But he’s running for speaker of the House, so the silliness is still evident,” he said.

Reply to “Comment on ‘Closure of the Child Tax Credit in the U.S. Congress’” by P. T. Brown

Patrick T. Brown is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, DC. He is also a former senior policy adviser to Congress’ Joint Economic Committee. Follow him on Twitter. The views expressed in this piece are his own. There is more opinion on CNN.

The Senate Appropriations Committee has been working on a spending bill since October and hopes to have it passed by Christmas.

There are plenty of reasons to complain about the process. Congress uses a crutch to keep its lights on when it mandates that lawmakers vote for bills they can’t read in their entirety.

The Republicans will not want to hear it, but this product will make a difference by removing a potential stumbling block from their path.

The letter was released by 13 House members, including the America First poster boy Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida. McCarthy backed up their vow to oppose any legislative priority of those senators who vote for the bill.

But Republicans don’t have to embrace the lame-duck deal to appreciate the silver lining of something getting passed, as ugly as it may seem. Without an appropriations deal, the government would have been facing a short term extension of funding early next year. That would have been a good time for the firebrand caucus of the GOP to start their time in the majority by causing a government shutdown.

The Republican-led shutdowns from 1995 to 1996 and 2013) failed to achieve much policy change, and resulted in poor poll numbers for GOP leaders. There is little reason to think that this go-round would be different, and some members may be relieved to have that taken off the table.

While there is a lot of complaining by Republicans, they have reason to be frustrated with how negotiations that could have helped parents and families didn’t happen.

The lack of work requirements in the Child Tax Credit made it impractical for Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, who was a member of the Child Tax Credit Subcommittee, to revive it. The White House stated all year long that there were no work requirements for expansion, but at the last moment reversed their position.

If a deal were to be reached, Democrats should have been talking with the senators who have proposed variations of pro-family tax reform. Democrats could be given time to work together in the upcoming era of divided governance.

Another common-sense initiative that fell victim to partisan bickering was legislation that would have brought much-needed clarity to the legal landscape around accommodations for expectant mothers in the workplace. Conservative groups and left-leaning women’s organizations back the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act in order to provide maternity benefits to women who choose abortion.

The fact that the negotiations went down to the last minute shows how many in Congress prefer culture war battles to compromise, even though Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy helped lead bipartisan talks to resolve some of these concerns and included the act in the omnibus.

Republicans will not take a small deal of pleasure in running against $575 million in grants for contraceptives in the name of reproductive health if they are elected.

That doesn’t mean there’s nothing good in the omnibus. Congress included funding for a task force, a hotline for maternal health and a study about the impact of tech use on teen mental health in it’s appropriations for the current fiscal year.

They extended funding for low-income mothers for up to a year after birth under Medicaid and increased funding for the child care block grant.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/21/opinions/republicans-omnibus-spending-deal-brown/index.html

The Devil is in the Details: Reconciling Procedural Motions to Improve the Senate’s Five-Person Threshold

For now, avoiding at least one self-inflicted wound may be the best parting gift Republicans could ask for from an era of unified Democratic control. And the fact that 21 GOP senators voted yes on a procedural motion to advance the deal suggests many in the upper chamber know that.

And some of McCarthy’s fiercest critics, including Reps. Matt Gaetz of Florida and Ralph Norman of South Carolina, told CNN they see the five-person threshold as still too high, underscoring the significant challenge McCarthy faces as he works to lock down the speakership.

Some in the moderate wing of the party are of the opinion that a five-person threshold is too low for them.

All of this will be a major topic of discussion during a crucial conference call on Friday afternoon that McCarthy scheduled with the various ideological caucuses in the House GOP, just four days ahead of the January 3 speaker’s vote.

Lawmakers worked over the weekend to finalize the rules package. McCarthy told the Republicans on the conference-wide call Sunday evening that he had agreed to the five-person threshold as a compromise and that he would not oppose the motion.

“The ‘devil is in the details’ as far as threshold & other rule concessions,” Norman said. People won’t move votes until the details of the election are spelled out in writing and posted on social media.

Correlating the Falsehoods and Fauxty of Rep.-Elect George Santos: Why Democrats Shouldn’t They?

Editor’s Note: Dean Obeidallah, a former attorney, is the host of SiriusXM radio’s daily program “The Dean Obeidallah Show.” Follow him @[email protected]. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his own. View more opinion on CNN.

GOP Rep.-elect George Santos has been making headlines since December 19 — when The New York Times published its jaw-dropping article documenting his litany of false claims about his work experience, education and just about everything in between. (Santos later described these falsehoods as “resume embellishment” but admitted to misrepresenting his employment and educational background.)

His grandparents fled the horrors of the Holocaust, only to have a different version of their family history disproved by a genealogy review. Santos did not reply to the request for comment.

Adding to the firestorm are recent developments that federal and state authorities have launched criminal investigations into Santos over his finances and fabrications. When he first ran for Congress unsuccessfully in 2020, Santos reported he had no assets, yet somehow he was able to lend his 2022 campaign $700,000.

But it’s not just McCarthy. The GOP leadership has been quiet about him. The top Republican in the House has chimed in on at least one occasion. In remarks Thursday on Fox News, Comer described Santos’ actions as “a disgrace, he’s lied to the voters.” He said he is pretty confident that the House Ethics Committee will investigate Santos, and that he didn’t call for Santos to step aside.

McCarthy has also criticized the Biden administration’s border policy and played up accusations on Fox Business that the FBI worked to suppress news stories hurtful to Democrats.

Imagine a situation where a member of congress was caught up in a scandal. McCarthy would be screaming about the need for the Democratic leadership to condemn the politician who should not be in Congress.

The Congress is Not Enough: Reply to a Hard Linear Call on Senator Mitch McCarthy to the House Speakers Election

In the last 90 years, all but one of the potential new House speakers had at least 230 seats in their majority. Speakers whose party held fewer seats than that all had the power of incumbency (i.e., having been elected to the position at least once before).

A CNN/SSRS poll last month found that his net favorable (i.e. favorable minus unfavorable) rating was +30 points among Republicans. That is certainly not bad. (Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell has notoriously low ratings among Republicans.) Net favorability rating of 30-plus points is not very good.

Either way, all of this GOP angst is a pretty decent consolation prize for Democrats after losing the House majority. If nothing else, they’re watching a Republican Party that can’t seem to get its act together after a historically bad midterm for an opposition party.

McCarthy released the final rules package later that evening and also put out a “Dear Colleague” letter making one last pitch for the job, which included additional promises about how he’d govern as speaker – including ensuring that the GOP’s ideological groups are better represented on committees.

Not long after Sunday’s call, a group of nine hardliners – who had outlined their demands to McCarthy last month – put out a new letter saying some of the concessions he announced are insufficient and making clear they’re still not sold on him, though they did say progress is being made.

“Thus far, there continue to be missing specific commitments with respect to virtually every component of our entreaties, and thus, no means to measure whether promises are kept or broken,” the letter, obtained by CNN, states.

Corresponding to Gimenez: Bringing the Motion to Vacate to a Single Lawmaker, Not a Cudgel over McCarthy

Some moderates – who fear the motion to vacate will be used as constant cudgel over McCarthy’s head – pushed back and expressed their frustration during the call, sources said.

Rep. Carlos Gimenez of Florida then repeated Diaz-Balart’s question, asking McCarthy to answer it. Sources say that McCarthy told them they need to close the deal in a couple days.

Rep.-elect Mike Lawler of New York asked Gaetz if he would back McCarthy if he agreed to bring the motion to vacate threshold down to a single lawmaker, which is what it used to be before Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, changed the rules. Gaetz said that McCarthy wouldn’t consider it if he were making that offer now.

A package that was released late Sunday includes giving five Republicans the power to call for a vote on deferring the sitting speaker and restoring the ability to zero out a government official’s salary.

The rules package does not change the process for discharge petitions, which allows lawmakers to circumvent leadership and force a bill to the floor if it has the support of 218 lawmakers.

The rules package prohibits remote hearings and markups, doesn’t allow staffer unionization, and the House Ethics Committee has the power to take ethic complaints from the public.

Four days before the House speaker vote, when his critics were still noncommittal about their support for his speakership bid, even after the California Republican had offered a number of key concessions – including making it easier to oust the sitting speaker – he attempted to give them the hard sell.

But now with just one day to go, a group of at least nine Republicans made clear that they are still not sold, even after McCarthy gave in to some of their most ardent demands, which he outlined during a Sunday evening conference call.

“To be honest, we are preparing for a fight. Not the way we want to start out in our new majority, but you can’t really negotiate against the position of ‘give us everything we ask for and we won’t guarantee anything in return,’” Rep. Kelly Armstrong of North Dakota, a member of the centrist-leaning Republican Governance Group, told CNN.

“I give Kevin a ton of credit. He’s brought everyone in and worked really hard to figure out a way forward. A way to make this place run better. But I get the feeling that not everyone is negotiating in good faith.”

McCarthy worked the phone with critics and supporters alike to find consensus on rules changes designed to win over holdouts during the week leading up to New Year’s.

The fight against McCarthy in the House: how committee chairs have been affected by the loss of a re-elected speaker and the fate of staff salaries

He can only afford to lose four votes on the House floor, and so far, at least five Republicans have vowed to oppose him, with nearly a dozen other GOP lawmakers publicly saying they’re still not there yet.

That group is still pushing for a single member to be able to call for a vote toppling the speaker, which is what it used to be before Speaker Nancy Pelosi changed the rules, and they also want a commitment that leadership won’t play in primaries.

In another strategic move, McCarthy postponed races for any contested committee chairs until after the speaker vote. He said it was for freshman members to have input in the process in order to protect himself from criticism from people who lose their races.

In phone calls and text messages during the holidays, McCarthy’s defenders vowed to him and each other they wouldn’t let a handful of members control their conference.

McCarthy’s opposition, however, has also been working in tandem – and they are far more practiced in playing hardball, though the Freedom Caucus has been openly divided over McCarthy.

The practical implications and pitfalls of a drawn-out speaker’s fight were laid out in a letter from the committee in charge of administrative matters. Without an approved House Rules package, the memo outlined that committees won’t be able to pay staff.

The same memo, which was first reported by Politico and obtained by CNN, also warned that student loan payments for committee staff wouldn’t be disbursed if a rules package isn’t adopted by mid-January.

It’s just one of the many ways a battle over the next speaker could paralyze the House and the Republican majority from operating efficiently in their opening days with some of the harshest penalties falling on rank-and-file staffers.

Even with the race far from settled, boxes from McCarthy’s office were spotted by CNN being moved into the speaker’s suite last week – a standard protocol, but a sign he’s committed to seeking the job.

One member stated that the current standoff between pro- and anti-McCarthy groups is a game of chicken where both sides have removed the steering wheel from the dashboard.

Can Republicans Weaken the Speaker of the House of Representatives to the Second Session of the Congres? The Case of Rep. McMills

A failed vote would badly weaken Mr. McCarthy or whoever the new speaker will be. The power of the House speaker is determined by the ability to get 218 votes in order to pass a bill. If Republicans are unable to come up with the votes for a speaker, it will be clear to everyone that they can not be counted on to fulfill their basic responsibilities such as funding the government or preventing a credit default.