House Republican candidates are ostensibly running on issues this fall. Odious chair of the House Republican Conference and Rep. Elise Stefanik insisted as much in a Fox interview this weekend. “Republicans are going to fight on behalf of the American people to help save America, to focus on economic issues, to rein in the spending that’s driving our inflation, to unleash American energy independence to lower the price of gas, energy, home heating bills. So there’s a lot that the average American family is concerned about. Republicans have solutions and legislation ready to move in the first 100 days,” she said.
They don’t, actually. They have a snazzy website and a one-page “Commitment to America” memo, a summary of platitudes like “support our troops,” “exercise peace through strength with our allies to counter increasing global threats,” “recover lost learning from school closures,” and “uphold free speech.” And, of course, “rigorous oversight.” All of which really means tax cuts (and defunding the IRS again, which effectively means more tax cuts) and investigations.
Here’s a 100% guaranteed promise for all investigations, all the time. Here’s Rep. James Comer, who is the ranking member on the House Oversight Committee and thus the guy who will get the chair if Republicans take over.
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It’s all about vengeance. It’s been all about vengeance since the nation had the temerity to elect a Black man to the White House and that president was able to do big stuff, like lower millions of people’s health insurance costs. The good news is that after 12 years, the Republicans have finally abandoned Obamacare repeal. (Mostly.)
House Republicans who never managed to actually come up with a health care alternative to the Affordable Care Act and whose only real accomplishment when in the majority has been tax cuts for the rich have one skill: holding a grudge and making political hay out of it. Democrats impeached Trump? Republicans will impeach President Joe Biden, whether he actually did anything or not.
And not just Biden—they’ve already filed 14 impeachment resolutions against Biden as well as Vice President Kamala Harris, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, and Attorney General Merrick Garland. Five of them have come from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, most recently seen riling up a MAGA crowd with fascistic, dangerous rhetoric: “Biden’s 5 million illegal aliens are on the verge of replacing you, your jobs, and your kids in school. Coming from all over the world, they’re also replacing your culture.”
Don’t think because Greene is a dangerous whack-job she doesn’t have sway in the Republican caucus. She was sitting right up front when House Speaker Kevin McCarthy unveiled his “commitment” in Pennsylvania last month. “I’m going to be a strong legislator and I’ll be a very involved member of Congress,” she told the Associated Press. “I know how to work inside, and I know how to work outside. And I’m looking forward to doing that.”
The feckless McCarthy has already given in to her, clearly. So if the House does flip to Republicans, he’s going to need her and the other MAGA crowd to hang on to leadership. One Democratic aide put it bluntly and graphically in a Politico interview: “Those members will have his balls in such a vice grip that when they say ‘jump’, he’ll say ‘how high’, and it’ll be too late before he realizes the fall will kill them.”
That assessment was essentially confirmed by Comer. When he was asked recently about whether there was going to be caucus pressure to impeach Biden, he answered, “I’m not under pressure, because that’s gonna be McCarthy’s job.”
Don’t let Marjorie Taylor Greene become the puppet master in charge of the House of Representatives. Help keep the House in Democratic hands.
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After an eruption of even more scandals among Republican Senate candidates, FiveThirtyEight’s Nathaniel Rakich returns to The Downballot this week to discuss the effect these sorts of scandals can have on competitive races; whether Democrats stand a chance to keep the House; and the different ways pollsters create likely voter models.