By Deisy Francis Mexidor
Chief US correspondent
Only eight of the 222 Republican members of the House managed to push through their expulsion agenda against their colleague from California on October 3, adding the voice of the Democratic caucus that was unwilling to save McCarthy.
Since then, this 435-member legislative body – the aforementioned number from the Republican Party and 213 from the Democratic Party – has been without a president for more than three weeks.
During this time, all work in the chamber was paralyzed, from postponed projects to the negotiations allowing the approval of the fiscal year 2024 budget, which began on October 1.
The death warrant was signed by McCarthy himself, colluding at the last minute with Democrats to fund the federal government beyond September 30, when funds would run out and result in the damaging shutdown or shutdown.
The continuing resolution, which passed before the deadline, gave Congress about 45 days to negotiate. “I don’t regret negotiating,” McCarthy said on the night of Tuesday, October 3rd.
But one of his political assassins, Congressman Matt Gaetz, a far-right Republican from Florida, had predicted exclusion if he worked with Democrats to expand that funding.
Days before his ouster, Gaetz recalled that McCarthy “reached an agreement with House conservatives in January and has blatantly, repeatedly and significantly broken it since then.”
The pact “made with the Democrats to largely overcome the spending hurdles we have put in place was really the last straw,” the Florida representative emphasized.
McCarthy took office in January after 15 rounds of voting, amid divisions in the Republican ranks, with him having to make too many concessions to the extremist wing that later scandalously and even humiliated him from office in his own rise to power.
The pro-democracy organization Stand Up America warned that the vote to remove McCarthy shows “how determined ultra-MAGA (Make America Great Again, a slogan popularized by former President Donald Trump) Republicans are to sow chaos and dysfunction rather than to Govern” on behalf of the American people.
“It is clear who is really in charge of the Republican conference: Matt Gaetz and his band of political firebrands,” he said, emphasizing that the MAGA Republicans’ only agenda “is to cripple the federal government and use their power to to make political demands.” Taking revenge and attacking our democracy and fundamental freedoms.
FIGHT FOR THE GALLET
There was uncertainty in the House of Representatives for three weeks. The body’s former president, Newt Gingrich, warned that the eight Republicans who supported the impeachment motion had “unleashed anger” at the convention.
In addition to Gaetz, who led the motion to overthrow McCarthy, Representatives Andy Biggs (Arizona), Ken Buck (Colorado) and Tim Burchett (Tennessee) supported this initiative – which was successful for the first time in the legislative history of the United States., Eli Crane (Arizona), Bob Good (Virginia), Nancy Mace (South Carolina) and Matt Rosendale (Montana).
For Gingrich, what has happened in the House in recent days is nothing short of “disaster” and he warned of the “very real danger” that he will elect someone and in a few weeks “a group of people will explode.” . and decide to fall back into the same mess.”
In the fight for the presidency of the House of Representatives, four candidates emerged against the backdrop of extreme divisions among Republicans.
The first to pass the nomination test in the Republican conference was House Majority Leader Steve Scalise of Louisiana, a stalwart soldier of the party who dropped out of the race as soon as he realized he was involved in support it would be for him impossible to reach the magic number 217, the minimum amount to access the position.
The 217 votes represented a Herculean task in an obviously fractured bench.
The second candidate was House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan of Ohio, founder of the conservative Freedom Caucus, who despite his insistence lost three votes in a row and when he refused to resign, his own colleagues turned their backs on him.
Meanwhile, the third Republican candidate turned out to be Majority Leader Tom Emmer, who hardly liked the appointment because he quickly discovered that support for his candidacy was limited to those who had secretly voted for him as the conference met to decide on it.
The Minnesota lawmaker’s resignation came shortly after former President Trump issued a scathing statement against him, calling him a “RINO” (Republican In Name Only).
The fourth candidate, Mike Johnson, emerged at a time when there were repeated calls to clean up the mess.
On October 25, the Republican Party decided to show unity and this politician from Louisiana achieved 220 votes (three more than the required minimum), securing him election as the 56th President of the House of Representatives of the US Congress. Joining .
WITH A HARDLINE STORY
Johnson was one of Trump’s most ardent and loyal supporters in Congress as election-theft rhetoric reached impressive levels in November 2020, but before his meteoric rise to the presidency he was virtually unknown despite having a tough past.
“The fact that there is now an election denier as speaker of the House of Representatives shows that democracy in this country is still under a tremendous attack,” said Colorado Secretary of State Jana Griswold, as quoted by The Hill newspaper.
“I don’t think any member of Congress who is a Republican and voted for him can escape the fact that he has increased extremism in this country,” said the president, also president of the Democratic Association of Secretaries of State.
The Democratic Party is betting that Johnson’s fervent support for the former president and his stance on issues like same-sex marriage, abortion and overturning the 2020 election results will backfire on undecided voters and independents in 2024.
Johnson led the drafting of an amicus brief in support of a lawsuit in Texas challenging the results of the 2020 presidential election, making the congressman a key figure in Republican efforts to overturn the election.
He is also considered a key ally of the anti-abortion movement, having supported legislation that restricted the procedure, such as the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act and the Heartbeat Protection Act of 2021.
He also supported proposals that would cut Social Security and Medicare.
The strategy of the opposition party (in this case the Democrats, a minority in the chamber) to make the president of the lower house a burden on the candidates, especially in very competitive areas, is not new.
At the time, Republicans tried to portray Nancy Pelosi (Democrat from California) as an element against the party’s candidates.
Perhaps now, with Johnson in the Republican leadership position in this legislative body, Democrats had an opportunity to “return the favor.”
They think it’s just the right time to define not just who Mike Johnson is and what he stood for, but also who he is with and against, warned Antjuan Seawright, a Democratic strategist.
For example, the newspaper reported that New York Rep. Mike Lawler was facing a difficult re-election fight in his district, and when he voted for Johnson, a Democrat on the floor was heard shouting “goodbye” to him.
The United States Congress consists of the 100-member Senate, controlled by Democrats, and the 435-member House of Representatives.
In the midterm elections in November 2022, the Democrats narrowly lost the lower house, where the balance of power is 222 seats for the Republicans and 213 for the ruling party.
Some analysts believe the new display of incompetence and extremism could hamper the Republican Party’s attempt to retain the undecided seats it needs to maintain its House majority in 2024.
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