Representative Dan Bishop spoke with members of the Freedom Caucus to announce that they will oppose the agreement to raise the debt limit on May 30.
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Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images
Representative Dan Bishop spoke with members of the Freedom Caucus to announce that they will oppose the agreement to raise the debt limit on May 30.
Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images
Nearly a dozen members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus rebelled against House Speaker Kevin McCarthy on Tuesday, disrupting a procedural vote that was expected to pass easily with support. House of the Republican Party.
In the 206 to 220 vote, rebel Republicans joined Democrats in blocking debate over a pair of Republican bills that would strengthen gas stove protections.
Public humiliation hit for McCarthy and House Republican leadership following internal discord over debt ceiling deal brokered by speaker and President Biden.
“There’s a lot of discussion going on between the group that’s very healthy and I look forward to getting back together later,” said Tom Emmer, the Republican head of the House of Representatives, offering an opinion piece. positive consequences.
Republicans jostled each other and began meeting in the House after the rare failure of a so-called rule-by-rule vote that would allow debate on the gas stove bill.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., can be seen in stiff fights with some Republicans who voted no on the floor.
A group of Freedom Caucus members then met with Speaker McCarthy on Tuesday night.
“We have some more conversations,” Texas Congressman Chip Roy told reporters as he was about to leave the meeting. Roy, whose GOP group voted against, declined to comment on the details of the meeting.
“We had an incident in the course of last week,” he said. “We think we need to get the process back on track.”
Rep. Patrick McHenry, one of the key negotiators on the speaker’s team on the debt limit agreement, told reporters the speaker was working to resolve “internal tensions among Republicans.” in the House of Commons.”
“Sometimes, you have to have a harmony in your family,” he said. “I think that’s part of what happened today.”
Republicans claim he was threatened with debt limit vote
South Carolina GOP Representative Ralph Norman, a member of the Freedom Caucus who also voted against the Republican measure, told reporters that members’ rejection of the rule was “about a lot of things. ” He said that includes frustration over the debt ceiling deal and apparent slowness on Congressman Andrew Clyde’s bill regarding pistol stabilizers.
“It’s about moving the bill – brace rule – keeping it and not putting it on the floor,” he said. “That’s part of it.”
Last week, Clyde spoke on Provocateur Steve Bannon’s Controversial Podcast that House leadership threatened to block his pistol brace bill if he voted against the debt ceiling law. Clyde is a sponsor of the pistol brace bill.
“I was told by the leadership that if I don’t vote for the rule [for the debt ceiling debate]that it would be very difficult to get my bill on the floor,” Clyde said.
McHenry told reporters that neither he nor the speaker participated in conversations that suggested members would be punished for not voting in favor of the debt ceiling law.
Leaving the House of Representatives on Tuesday afternoon, Democratic Representative Steny Hoyer told reporters: “We have a small but very stubborn group of people who unfortunately have more influence than they should.”
What does this mean for McCarthy?
House Freedom Caucus members have been voiced their frustration with McCarthy on recent debt ceiling legislation, argued that the speaker had not done enough to force significant spending cuts.
But it’s not clear whether members will petition to vacate, a rule McCarthy agreed to in January when he was still a teenager. fight to be a speaker that would allow any member of the House to come up with a solution to remove the speaker.
On Monday night, Norman said it was not “the right time” to discuss McCarthy’s removal – however, he was quick to add that there was obvious frustration in his caucus that.
“We thought he gave away the farm,” he told NPR of the debt deal, adding that McCarthy has other ways to “show his conservatism” going forward.
“Fighting another day means you look at appropriations, look at reallocating the military budget, look at the farm bill,” he said. “There are other things he could do in hopes of getting this country back on financial footing.”
Virginia Republican Bob Good, also a member of the Freedom Caucus, told NPR the group will continue to push for “meaningful spending cuts.” Good also joins Republicans, who passed Tuesday’s vote.
“I think we need to look at all the spending bills and see where we can cut back, spend unnecessary waste, spend irrationally, or actually spend money that is harmful to the American people. ” he said.
