McCarthy’s plans for impeachment didn’t seem to make a difference in the shutdown threat

Kevin McCarthy, the Freedom Caucus, and the Taxpayer’s Choice: An Indirect Congressional Apportionment Investigation, Not a Shutdown

Kevin McCarthy started an impeachment investigation to show those on the far right of the conference that he was listening to. It could help fund the government, as well as avoid a government shut down at the end of the month.

Hours after his Tuesday announcement the House Freedom Caucus insisted that the inquiry is not changing their calculations on spending.

The two conversations and actions by Congress are separate, said a member of the Freedom Caucus. “There is no leverage with an impeachment process. If anyone tries to use that to try and get votes for a CR. [a short-term spending bill known as a continuing resolution], there will be hell to pay.”

McCarthy cannot afford to lose fiscal conservatives if he courts Democratic votes, which would in turn cause outrage within the group threatening his job.

McCarthy’s own allies admitted it was unclear how they would avoid a shutdown, but made the case it was important to get incremental wins now — some spending bills passed out of the House.

Members of the Freedom Caucus are calling for overall spending to return to fiscal year 2022 levels, as they pushed for when McCarthy was elected speaker. Those levels are lower than what McCarthy and President Biden agreed to during debt ceiling negotiations this spring.

The Freedom Caucus in the White House: How is the spending puzzle going to the Senate? Sen. Dan Bishop, Rep. Mike McCarthy, and Majority Leader Steve Womack

They will oppose any stopgap measure that does not include border security funding, changes to Pentagon policies and measures to address alleged political bias in the Justice Department.

House Freedom Caucus member Dan Bishop, R-N.C., said he will not support moving forward with any of the 12 appropriations bills until he knows how much money is going to go to pay for everything.

Gaetz threatened to force a vote on the floor of the House to oust McCarthy after accusing the speaker of being out of compliance with an agreement he made with conservatives to get the gavel.

Bob Good, a member of the Freedom Caucus, told reporters that he wants the speaker to outline in writing how the spending puzzle fits together. He said the House can stay in session for the rest of the month and pass bills one-by-one at the levels conservatives want.

House Rules Committee Chair Rep. Tom Cole disagreed that there wouldn’t be any impact from a shutdown, saying “it is a big deal and the American people will notice, and the problem is if you stumble into it whatever reason triggered it won’t be what you’re talking about, you’ll be talking about the shutdown.”

Steve Womack said that there were thin margins with several House Republicans away this week, including Majority Leader Steve Simpson who is undergoing cancer treatment. He called it a difficult spot to keep all GOP lawmakers together.

“We have solutions that the Senate needs to listen to and moving some bills through the House sends a signal that we’re serious about what we do and we have some solutions that they need to listen to”, said Womack.

Rep. Patrick McHenry, a close ally of McCarthy who was a key negotiator during debt ceiling talks, was more optimistic about the chance that Republicans could get on the same page.

Rep. Brian Mast: Getting the Most Out of Your House Speaker’s Debt-Clearing Voting, Not Yours

Shutting down the government is the political equivalent of putting a gun to your head and saying ‘do what I say or I’ll shoot’ — you hurt yourself, you’re not going to advance your objective.

At the end of the day, what we negotiated as a result of the debt ceiling increase will be the only thing that is enacted into law. “We negotiated tough caps that we have to adhere to. And if some senators want to spend more than the caps, and some House Republicans want to spend less than the caps, where do we end up? There are caps. I think that’s a reasonable outcome of this thing.”

The speaker pitched combining three bills that fund security-related programs — Defense, Military Construction and VA and Homeland Security – with emergency money for disaster aid for the recent fires and storms that have wreaked havoc in states across the country.

McCarthy dared his critics at a Thursday morning meeting of House GOP members to stop talking about ejecting him from his job and start the formal process of doing it, saying “‘If you want to file a motion to vacate, then file the f** motion,’ ” according to Rep. Brian Mast, R-Fla.

A speaker’s job is in danger if a motion to vacating is made. A motion to vacate is the technical step needed to strip a speaker of his or her job. It is the same method that led to the resignation of Speaker John Houser, R-Ohio, in 2015.

After the meeting, the speaker downplayed the exchange, telling reporters that threats are unimportant and that people often do those things for personal reasons. McCarthy pointed out that the 15 rounds of voting that were held in January were different from the ones before him as a reason why he was elected speaker.

He said he knew members may try to use leverage to get things they want, and said, “you know what, if it takes a fight I’ll have a fight.” He ignored a question on whether he had the votes to defeat any effort to oust him.

The failure on defense spending followed objections from the same hard-line conservatives threatening McCarthy. At a time when politicians are being pressed to move quickly to avoid a shutdown, it has become a persistent dysfunctional dynamic.

The Senate is moving a package of spending bills through the chamber, but there’s no plan for how to fund the government after September 29 and lawmakers are heading home for the weekend.

The contrast between the House and Senate was on full display Thursday as the Senate voted 91-7 to advance a package of three spending bills just hours after the fraught GOP meeting in the House.

The Freedom Caucus: Pushing Back the Decline to the End of the Overdue Delay and Call for a Closer Look

Richard Hudson, a top ally of McCarthy, did not agree with the idea that a shutdown was inevitable.

The Freedom Caucus’ Dan Bishop said he wouldn’t vote for any appropriations bills until he was certain top line numbers were satisfactory. The Freedom Caucus said that they wouldn’t vote for a defense bill that funds the Pentagon’s “woke” policies, such as providing health care to service men and women who are trans, and reimburses members who travel for reproductive care. A budget bill that contains money for the war in Ukraine will not be supported by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green, a close ally of McCarthy who is also an extreme member of the conference.

The Freedom Caucus also opposes a short-term stopgap measure to keep the government open — known as a continuing resolution — unless that measure includes key conservative demands.

The conference can not come up with a plan to avert a shutdown by the deadline. Mast shared McCarthy’s frustration with trying to function under persistent threats from some within their own party.

“If you have a direction that you want to take, then step up in front of the microphone and voice what that direction is that you want to take,” Mast said. Get the f*ck out of the way.