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The House Rules Committee will meet for the first time with its new Freedom Caucus-ish controlling bloc of three members to determine the process for these votes. You can bet that the open amendment process they had in place last week for a putative energy-related bill won’t be repeated for this bunch of bills.
Additionally, the House will vote on the ever-critical denunciation of the horrors of socialism. For real. The gotcha bill H. Con. Res 9 declares that “Congress denounces socialism in all its forms, and opposes the implementation of socialist policies in the United States of America.”
Now do fascism, Republicans. I dare you.
The House still has committee organizing to finish, and that might include the vote on whether Rep. Ilhan Omar retains her seat on the Foreign Affairs Committee. McCarthy’s math on that one is still a problem for him—there are two pretty definite GOP “no” votes, a number of undecideds, and one GOP member out for a least a few more weeks. This could be the first instance where McCarthy’s very slim four-vote majority, along with his decision to end of proxy voting, could come back to bite him.
It’s also going to be “oversight” time in the House, which will basically mean a lot of screeching from Reps. Jim Jordan and James Comer. Jordan’s Judiciary Committee will have a hearing on “The Biden Border Crisis.” The Oversight Committee, packed with election deniers, QAnon adherents, and conspiracy theorists, will have one titled “Federal Pandemic Spending: A Prescription for Waste, Fraud, and Abuse.”
The Senate still hasn’t voted on an organizing resolution because six new GOP senators still haven’t figured out the committees they want to be on—not after the massive faux pas of newly elected Missouri Republican Sen. Eric Schmitt, who asked senior members to please exit their plum Judiciary Committee seats so he could have one.
This might just be a petty delaying tactic by Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. You might remember last session, when the Senate was tied 50-50 and McConnell dragged the organizing resolution out for nearly a month to prevent the Democrats from getting a jump start on legislating. There really aren’t big things at stake this time around since with a GOP House, legislating is definitely back-burnered, but McConnell’s default mode is obstruction.
Nearly a month in and the Senate hasn’t been able to finish organizing. But there is a roll call vote scheduled for late Monday afternoon. They just haven’t determined yet what that vote will be about.
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The Freedom Caucus in now going to be in charge of House Rules. Wheeeeee!!!!
On this episode of The Downballot, don't miss a special double-guest episode. Hear from Tiffany Muller, the president of End Citizens United, as she discusses the group's efforts to roll back the corrupting effects of the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision and their plans for campaign finance reform. Then, law professor Quinn Yeargain joins to discuss the surprising setback Gov. Kathy Hochul faced in the state capitol and what it means for the future of New York's top court.
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