Heather Cox Richardson's Blog, page 162
January 10, 2023
January 10, 2023
National security scholar Maria W. Norris of Coventry University, who is covering events in Brazil, reports that today, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva gathered around him the president of the supreme court and the governors or vice-governors of each state, the senators, the attorney general, and congressional representatives, all of whom condemned the coup. Many had been staunch supporters of former president Jair Bolsonaro, but since the coup failed, they have thrown their lot behind Lula. After they declared their support, Lula led them through the vandalized buildings, symbolically reclaiming them.
Lula and his administration say that police worked with the rioters, and a judge has approved warrants for the arrest of two key law enforcement officials close to Bolsonaro: Anderson Torres and Colonel Fábio Augusto Vieira. Police have also searched Torres’s home. Pro-Bolsonaro groups have been camped near military posts and buildings since the election; it appears the insurrectionists’ plan was to induce the military to join them.
In the wake of the unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the government, Bolsonaro supporters are claiming that the attack was by leftists who infiltrated a peaceful protest. Police have so far arrested about 1500 participants.
Bolsonaro left Brazil for Florida before Lula took office, while he was still president. That status apparently enabled him to enter the U.S. on an A-1 visa, reserved for heads of state. That visa is normally canceled when the person holding it leaves office, but since he is already in this country, it is not clear what its status is. Normally, anyone on an A-1 visa who is no longer on official business must leave the country within 30 days, but if Brazil tries to extradite him, the process could stretch on, putting the Biden administration in an awkward position.
In contrast to the Bolsonaro supporters running from the coup, from his perch in the U.S., former Trump advisor Steve Bannon, who insisted all along—without evidence—that the election in Brazil was fraudulent, remained adamant that Lula must be replaced. “I’m not backing off one inch on this thing,” he said to Politico. Bannon is close to Bolsonaro’s son, who has been seen hobnobbing with Trump-affiliated people, including Trump’s daughter Ivanka.
Observers have noted the many similarities between the attack on the Brazilian government on January 8 and the attack on the U.S. government almost exactly two years earlier. But there are differences, too, and one of the big differences is that power had already changed hands in Brazil, and President Lula has compelled other leaders into a show of support even as the government is arresting rioters.
In the U.S., Trump was still in office when his supporters tried to overthrow the government, and there was neither a house cleaning nor a demand for lawmakers to declare their support for the duly elected government.
Many of those who supported Trump in the events of January 6, 2021, are still in Congress. At least six Republican congress members asked Trump for a preemptive pardon, and four of them are still in office. They make up the core of the far-right Republicans House speaker Kevin McCarthy had to bargain with to win the speakership: Representatives Scott Perry (R-PA), Andy Biggs (R-AZ), Matt Gaetz (R-FL), and Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA). Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH) was also part of the group that pressured McCarthy, and he, too, appears to have been deeply involved in the events of January 6: just days afterward, Trump awarded Jordan the Presidential Medal of Freedom with a somewhat generic citation that raised questions about why Trump was really giving Jordan the award.
Today the House voted on the rules package McCarthy promised to the far-right Republicans. As expected, it contained a threat to McCarthy: any single member can force a vote to toss out the House speaker. This rule was in place in 2015, when then-representative Mark Meadows (R-NC) invoked it against Speaker John Boehner (R-OH), who resigned rather than face a vote.
The deal cut with the far-right group gives them plum committee assignments, including a number of seats on the House Rules Committee. The deal required McCarthy to permit a number of symbolic votes on things important to that far-right group, and it appears to have promised to cap government funding at 2022 levels, worrying both those who want more defense spending and those who want to protect Social Security and Medicare. It also appears that McCarthy said he would not agree to raising the debt limit—that is, honoring the debts the country has already incurred—without “fiscal reforms.” That promise seems to hold the threat of a showdown over a national default.
And there are rumors of a secret agreement that has not been disclosed, an unfortunate start for the Republican majority, which promised to be transparent. Even some Republicans are demanding more information.
One of the things McCarthy did agree to was the creation of a select subcommittee in the Judiciary Committee to investigate the “weaponization of the federal government.” By a party line vote, the House today approved that committee to investigate what Republicans insist is an anti-Republican bias in the FBI and the Department of Justice. Jim Jordan will chair the committee, which theoretically can review ongoing criminal investigations, pretty clearly to protect Republicans in trouble. Former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance points out that the Department of Justice will never allow such a thing but dealing with the committee will waste time and resources. The Democrats will not boycott the select committee as the Republicans did the January 6 committee, suggesting that Jordan will not reign unchallenged.
Republicans clearly intend the committee to spread a narrative that will undermine the one established so powerfully by the Mueller investigation, the Trump impeachment committees, and the January 6 committee. The modern Republicans have always been closely tied to right-wing media, and nothing made that clearer than Fox News Channel personality Sean Hannity’s broadcast tonight. He did his show from the Rayburn Reception Room of the House of Representatives, “interviewing” Republican congress members so they could repeat talking points.
Yesterday, news broke that in November, President Joe Biden’s lawyers found “a small number” of classified documents from his vice-presidential years in a locked closet in Biden’s former office at Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement. They immediately contacted the National Archives and Records Administration, which retrieved the documents the same day. Biden said that he did not know the documents were there and that his lawyers “did what they should have done” when they called NARA. Attorney General Merrick Garland assigned a Trump-appointed U.S. attorney, John R. Lausch Jr., to see if he should appoint a special counsel.
Trump and his supporters immediately tried to suggest Biden was getting better treatment than he did, but journalist Matthew Miller notes that classified documents often get taken from government facilities by accident. Those errors are reported, the documents recovered, and a damage assessment made to determine whether further action needs to be taken.
In Trump’s case, NARA repeatedly asked him simply to return the documents it knew he had. He refused for a year, then let them recover 15 boxes that included classified documents, withholding others. After a subpoena, his lawyers turned over more documents and signed an affidavit saying that was all of them. But of course it wasn’t: the FBI’s August search of Mar-a-Lago recovered still more classified documents. Trump is being investigated now for obstruction and violations of the Espionage Act, which makes it a crime to withhold documents from a government official authorized to take them.
Today, New York State Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan sentenced former Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg to five months in jail at New York’s Rikers Island complex and five years probation after he pleaded guilty to 15 felonies in a scheme to provide Trump Organization employees direct benefits to avoid paying taxes. Weisselberg was the key witness in the trial last fall of the Trump Corporation and the Trump Payroll Corporation for tax fraud and falsifying records. A jury found the entities guilty of all charges, meaning the Trump Organization has been found guilty of criminal conduct, likely impacting its ability to do business and hurting Trump’s defense in other cases.
—
Notes:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mccarthy-motion-to-vacate-rule-speaker/
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/06/politics/trump-organization-fraud-trial-verdict/index.html
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/12/09/trump-organization-conviction-legal-00073141
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/01/10/brazil-riot-insurrection-bolsonaro-lula/
Dr Maria W. Norris she/her @MariaWNorrisHappening right now:Brazilian president Lula, the president of the supreme court, and governors (or vice gvns) of every single state, including those who supported Bolsonaro, together in the same room, unilaterally condemning the failed coup. Quite amazing really. 
10:31 PM ∙ Jan 9, 20232,592Likes655RetweetsDr Maria W. Norris she/her @MariaWNorrisRight, it's 8pm on Brazil, time for primetime news. But it's 11pm here in the UK. Let's see how much I can take in before I fall asleep.11:07 PM ∙ Jan 10, 2023https://www.politico.com/news/2023/01/09/bannon-brazil-riots-trump-00077155
https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/10/politics/house-republican-conference-rules-deal/index.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/01/10/house-republicans-rules-package-biden/
https://punchbowl.news/archive/1923-punchbowl-news-am/
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/01/10/house-republicans-justice-department-00077108
Matthew Miller @matthewamillerWorth noting what former government officials have said since Mar a Lago raid: classified docs get mistakenly removed from government facilities fairly frequently. You report it, turn in the docs, the government does a damage assessment, and that is the end of it. OR…10:51 PM ∙ Jan 9, 20232,361Likes507Retweets
George Conway🌻 @gtconway3dAnd it expressly violates the Espionage Act to "willfully retain[]" sensitive national defense information "and fail[] to deliver it on demand to the officer or employee of the United States entitled to receive it." Trump clearly did that; there's no suggestion Biden did. https://t.co/jXX42kfrYR
Joyce Alene @JoyceWhiteVance@gtconway3d The cover up proves malicious intent. If it was a mistake, Trump would have returned it as soon as NARA asked. That's why DOJ has a consistent record of requiring a plus factor like obstruction before indicting these case. If Trump had done what Biden did, no investigation.1:46 AM ∙ Jan 10, 20233,304Likes817Retweets@gtconway3d The cover up proves malicious intent. If it was a mistake, Trump would have returned it as soon as NARA asked. That's why DOJ has a consistent record of requiring a plus factor like obstruction before indicting these case. If Trump had done what Biden did, no investigation.","username":"JoyceWhiteVance","name":"Joyce Alene","date":"Tue Jan 10 01:40:14 +0000 2023","photos":[],"quoted_tweet":{},"retweet_count":817,"like_count":3872,"expanded_url":{},"video_url":null,"belowTheFold":true}">
Joyce Alene @JoyceWhiteVance@gtconway3d The cover up proves malicious intent. If it was a mistake, Trump would have returned it as soon as NARA asked. That's why DOJ has a consistent record of requiring a plus factor like obstruction before indicting these case. If Trump had done what Biden did, no investigation.1:40 AM ∙ Jan 10, 20233,872Likes817Retweets
Matt Laslo @MattLasloSean Hannity broadcasting from your United States House of Representatives 2:07 AM ∙ Jan 11, 2023257Likes88Retweets
January 9, 2023
January 9, 2023
The crisis in Brazil knocked my weekend into the week, but I’m going to post a picture tonight and get some rest to face the week.
I’ll see you tomorrow.
[Photo of the sunrise after this week’s snowstorm, by Buddy Poland.]
January 8, 2023
January 8, 2023
Today, in Brazil, supporters of former president Jair Bolsonaro attacked the presidential palace, congress, and supreme court, insisting that the country’s October election, in which voters replaced Bolsonaro with President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, was fraudulent. For months, Bolsonaro supporters have called for the military to stop Lula, as he is known, from taking office. Today, they attacked the government and called for military intervention to remove Lula from office. Many of them wrapped themselves in the Brazilian flag.
Lula was visiting flood victims 500 miles from the capital, Brasilia, when the attack occurred.
Bolsonaro is a far-right leader who launched attacks on LGBTQ people, women, and democracy. He said he was “proud to be homophobic” and “in favor of torture,” and that “[t]he Congress today is useless…let’s do the coup already. Let’s go straight to the dictatorship.” In July 2022, when polls showed him running significantly behind union leader Lula, he threatened to cancel the election altogether.
At first, Bolsonaro refused to concede the election, and then when Lula took office on January 1, he refused to attend and perform the rituals signaling a peaceful transition of power. Instead, he took off for Florida. At the time, reporters suggested he left to get out of reach as Lula’s prosecutors decided whether to pursue the many investigations of him that were underway, but now it seems reasonable to wonder if he was giving himself plausible deniability for today’s violence.
On Twitter tonight, Bolsonaro distanced himself from the attacks but compared them to “those practiced by the left.” He rejected the idea he had anything to do with today’s events.
The scenes of far-right insurrectionists, radicalized by leaders who refuse to accept the outcome of elections, were eerily reminiscent of the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol almost exactly two years ago that was a last-ditch attempt to keep then-president Trump in office. Indeed, Bolsonaro was Trump’s protégé in Brazil, and Trump supported Bolsonaro in his quest for reelection.
“‘Tropical Trump’ as he is affectionately called, has done a GREAT job for the wonderful people of Brazil,” Trump said on his social media outlet. “When I was President of the U.S., there was no other country leader who called me more than Jair.”
The far right in the U.S. saw the Brazil elections as crucially important to advancing the power of the global right. On his webcast War Room, for example, Steve Bannon, a key ally of former president Trump, insisted the election was stolen and urged Bolsonaro’s supporters to resist Lula’s inauguration. Bolsonaro’s son Eduardo is part of Bannon’s right-wing organization, “The Movement.” In a statement, the younger Bolsonaro promised to “work with him to reclaim sovereignty from progressive globalist elitist forces and expand common sense nationalism for all citizens of Latin America.” Eduardo has also been seen in Florida with Trump aide Jason Miller.
Political scientist Brian Klass observed that “[p]olitical scientists have a name for what’s happening in Brazil: ‘authoritarian learning.’ It’s when autocratic playbooks spread across borders. Trump taught the world how to do January 6th. Brazil won’t be the last one.”
President Joe Biden said: “I condemn the assault on democracy and on the peaceful transfer of power in Brazil. Brazil’s democratic institutions have our full support and the will of the Brazilian people must not be undermined. I look forward to continuing to work with [Lula].”
Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said: “Everyone must stand up and condemn the attack on Brazil’s Congress, Presidency, and Supreme Court. We stand with democracy and with the people of Brazil and against the demagogues who deny election results.”
House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) said: “The violent attack on the heart of the Brazilian government by right-wing extremists is a sad but familiar sight. We stand with the people of Brazil and democracy.”
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said: “We condemn the attacks on Brazil's Presidency, Congress, and Supreme Court today. Using violence to attack democratic institutions is always unacceptable.”
International democratic leaders, including Secretary-General of the U.N. António Guterres and President Emmanuel Macron of France, condemned the rioters in Brazil. Macron said: “The will of the Brazilian people and democratic institutions must be respected! President Lula da Silva can count on the unconditional support of France.”
As of 11:00 tonight, neither House speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) nor Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) had any comment on the events in Brazil.
By Sunday night, Brazilian police had retaken control of the vandalized buildings and arrested 170 rioters.
—
Notes:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/28/world/americas/brazil-president-jair-bolsonaro-quotes.html
@LulaOficial.","username":"POTUS","name":"President Biden","date":"Sun Jan 08 23:17:57 +0000 2023","photos":[],"quoted_tweet":{},"retweet_count":28631,"like_count":227065,"expanded_url":{},"video_url":null,"belowTheFold":true}">
President Biden @POTUSI condemn the assault on democracy and on the peaceful transfer of power in Brazil. Brazil’s democratic institutions have our full support and the will of the Brazilian people must not be undermined. I look forward to continuing to work with @LulaOficial.11:17 PM ∙ Jan 8, 2023227,065Likes28,631Retweets
Hakeem Jeffries @RepJeffriesThe violent attack on the heart of the Brazilian government by right-wing extremists is a sad but familiar sight.We stand with the people of Brazil and democracy.🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸10:00 PM ∙ Jan 8, 202338,753Likes5,998Retweets
Chuck Schumer @SenSchumerEveryone must stand up and condemn the attack on Brazil’s Congress, Presidency, and Supreme Court. We stand with democracy and with the people of Brazil and against the demagogues who deny election results.11:22 PM ∙ Jan 8, 202310,462Likes1,385Retweetshttps://apnews.com/article/caribbean-brazil-1c789f876515a64aa67f918f0d8d5fff
https://nacla.org/trump-allies-campaign-online-bolsonaro-and-spread-lies-about-electoral-fraud
https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/08/americas/brazil-bolsonaro-supporters-breach-congress/index.html
Brian Klaas @brianklaasPolitical scientists have a name for what’s happening in Brazil: “authoritarian learning.” It’s when autocratic playbooks spread across borders. Trump taught the world how to do January 6th. Brazil won’t be the last one.9:01 PM ∙ Jan 8, 20234,381Likes1,399Retweetshttps://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/brazil-protests-bolsonaro-congress
@LulaOficial in urging an immediate end to these actions.","username":"SecBlinken","name":"Secretary Antony Blinken","date":"Sun Jan 08 21:17:09 +0000 2023","photos":[],"quoted_tweet":{},"retweet_count":12967,"like_count":88271,"expanded_url":{},"video_url":null,"belowTheFold":true}">
Secretary Antony Blinken @SecBlinkenWe condemn the attacks on Brazil's Presidency, Congress, and Supreme Court today. Using violence to attack democratic institutions is always unacceptable. We join @LulaOficial in urging an immediate end to these actions.9:17 PM ∙ Jan 8, 202388,271Likes12,967Retweetshttps://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/01/08/bolsonaro-invade-congress-lula/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/11/23/brazil-bolsonaro-bannon/
@LulaOficial peut compter sur le soutien indéfectible de la France.","username":"EmmanuelMacron","name":"Emmanuel Macron","date":"Sun Jan 08 21:06:36 +0000 2023","photos":[],"quoted_tweet":{},"retweet_count":11900,"like_count":118820,"expanded_url":{},"video_url":null,"belowTheFold":true}">
Emmanuel Macron @EmmanuelMacronLa volonté du peuple brésilien et les institutions démocratiques doivent être respectées ! Le Président @LulaOficial peut compter sur le soutien indéfectible de la France.9:06 PM ∙ Jan 8, 2023118,820Likes11,900Retweetshttps://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/01/08/bolsonaro-rhetoric-supporters-storm-brazil-congress/
January 7, 2023
January 7, 2023
Early this morning, shortly after midnight, Republican Kevin McCarthy of California won enough votes to become speaker of the House of Representatives. Not since 1860, when it took 44 ballots to elect New Jersey’s William Pennington as a compromise candidate, has it taken 15 ballots to elect a speaker.
The spectacle of a majority unable to muster the votes to elect a speaker, while the Democratic opposition stayed united behind House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), raised ridicule across the country. McCarthy tried to put a good spin on it but inadvertently undercut confidence in his leadership when he, now the leader of the House, told reporters: “This is the great part…. Because it took this long, now we learned how to govern.”
But there is no doubt that the concessions he made to extremist Republicans to win their votes mean he has finally grasped the speaker’s gavel from a much weaker position than previous speakers. “He will have to live the entirety of his speakership in a straitjacket constructed by the rules that we’re working on now,” one of the extremist ring leaders, Matt Gaetz (R-FL) told reporters. Gaetz later explained away his willingness to accept McCarthy after vowing never to support McCarthy by saying “I ran out of things I could even imagine to ask for.”
In his acceptance speech, McCarthy first thanked the House clerk, Cheryl Johnson, who presided over the drawn-out fight. Johnson was chosen by Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) when she became speaker in 2018, and has served since 2019. Her work this week was impressive.
McCarthy promised that the Republicans recognized that their responsibility was not to themselves or their conference, but to the country, but then went on to lay out a right-wing wish list for investigations, business deregulation, and enhanced use of fossil fuels, along with attacks on immigration, “woke indoctrination” in public schools, and the 87,000 new IRS agents funded by the Inflation Reduction Act to enforce tax laws. Somewhat oddly, considering the Biden administration’s focus on China and successful start to the repatriation of the hugely important chip industry, McCarthy promised that the Republicans would essentially jump on Biden’s coattails, working to counter communist China and bring jobs home. McCarthy promised that Republicans would “be a check and provide some balance to the President’s policies.”
It was a speech that harked back to the past 40 years of Republican ideology, although he awkwardly invoked Emanuel Leutze’s heroic 1851 painting of Washington crossing the Delaware to suggest that America is a land in which “every individual is equal” and “we let everybody in the boat.” Despite the language of inclusion, just as the Republicans have since 1980, he emphasized that the Republicans would center the “hardworking taxpayer.” The Republican conference repeatedly jumped to its feet to applaud his promises, but it felt rather like listening to a cover band playing yesterday’s hits.
Immediately after his victory, McCarthy thanked the members who stayed with him through all the votes, but told reporters: “I do want to especially thank President Trump. I don’t think anybody should doubt his influence. He was with me from the beginning…. He would call me and he would call others…. Thank you, President Trump.”
Aaron Rupar of Public Notice pointed out that “McCarthy going out of his way to gush over Trump at a time when his influence is clearly diminished & political brand is more toxic to mainstream voters than ever—especially on the anniversary of the insurrection—is notable & indicative of who he'll be beholden to as speaker.”
I would go a step further and say that embracing Trump after his influence on the Republican Party has made it lose the last three elections suggests that, going forward, the party is planning either to convince more Americans to like the extremism of the MAGA Republicans—which is unlikely—or to restrict the vote so that opposition to that extremism doesn’t matter.
Yesterday, Ohio’s Republican governor, Mike DeWine, signed into law a series of changes in election law that include requiring a photo ID rather than permitting people to use other government documents or utility bills, shortening the time for returning ballots and fixing errors in them (called “curing”), prohibiting curbside voting, and limiting ballot drop boxes to one per county.
Also yesterday, a panel of three federal judges ruled that South Carolina’s First Congressional District is an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. Following the 2020 census, the Republican-dominated legislature moved 62% of the Black voters previously in that district into the Sixth District, turning what had recently been a swing district into a staunchly Republican one that Republican Nancy Mace won in November by 14 percentage points. District Judge Richard M. Gergel said: “If you see a turtle on top of a fence post, you know someone put it there…. This is not a coincidence.”
In contrast to McCarthy stood Minority Leader Jeffries, who used the ceremonial handing over of the speaker’s gavel from the Democrats to the Republicans to give a barn-burning speech. He began by praising “the iconic, the heroic, the legendary” former House speaker Nancy Pelosi as “the greatest speaker of all time,” and offering thanks to her lieutenants Steny Hoyer (D-MD) and Jim Clyburn (D-SC).
He reviewed the laws the Democrats have passed in the past two years—the American Rescue Plan, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, gun safety legislation, the CHIPS & Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act, among others. “It was one of the most consequential congresses in American history,” he said, accurately. He called for Democrats to continue the fight for lower costs, better paying jobs, safer communities, democracy, the public interest, economic opportunity for all, and reproductive freedom.
“As Democrats,” he said, “we do believe in a country for everyone…. We believe in a country with liberty and justice for all, equal protection under the law, free and fair elections, and yes, we believe in a country with the peaceful transfer of power.
“We believe that in America our diversity is a strength—it is not a weakness—an economic strength, a competitive strength, a cultural strength…. We are a gorgeous mosaic of people from throughout the world. As John Lewis would sometimes remind us on this floor, we may have come over on different ships but we’re all in the same boat now. We are white. We are Black. We are Latino. We are Asian. We are Native American.
“We are Christian. We are Jewish. We are Muslim. We are Hindu. We are religious. We are secular. We are gay. We are straight. We are young. We are older. We are women. We are men. We are citizens. We are dreamers.
“Out of many, we are one. That’s what makes America a great country, and no matter what kind of haters are trying to divide us, we’re not going to let anyone take that away from us, not now, not ever. This is the United States of America….
“So on this first day, let us commit to the American dream, a dream that promises that if you work hard and play by the rules, you should be able to provide a comfortable living for yourself and for your family, educate your children, purchase a home, and one day retire with grace and dignity.”
In this moment of transition, he said, the American people want to know what direction the Congress will choose. The Democrats offer their hand to Republicans to find common ground, Jeffries said, but “we will never compromise our principles. House Democrats will always put American values over autocracy…
“benevolence over bigotry, the Constitution over the cult, democracy over demagogues, economic opportunity over extremism, freedom over fascism, governing over gaslighting, hopefulness over hatred, inclusion over isolation, justice over judicial overreach, knowledge over kangaroo courts, liberty over limitation, maturity over Mar-a-Lago, normalcy over negativity, opportunity over obstruction, people over politics, quality of life issues over QAnon, reason over racism, substance over slander, triumph over tyranny, understanding over ugliness, voting rights over voter suppression, working families over the well-connected, xenial over xenophobia, ‘yes, we can’ over ‘you can’t do it,’ and zealous representation over zero-sum confrontation. We will always do the right thing by the American people.”
The torch has indeed passed to a new generation, at least of Democrats. Between them and the extremists in his own ranks, McCarthy has his work cut out for him.
—
Notes:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/07/politics/kevin-mccarthy-path-to-speakership/index.html
Acyn @AcynMcCarthy: But I do want to thank especially President Trump. I don’t think anybody should doubt his influence. 7:27 AM ∙ Jan 7, 20234,405Likes1,165Retweets
Pete Strzok @petestrzokCalled it. “On Tucker Carlson, Rep Massie announces McCarthy agreed to create a committee, à la Frank Church Committee, to investigate ‘influence of FBI and various intel agencies on domestic politics.’”https://t.co/XskjeXcCck https://t.co/wSlpEZjfpd
Deadline White House @DeadlineWH"I have every expectation that when we finally do arrive at some sort of speaker, you will see the House launch into investigations that are designed to further foment some sort of antagonistic response from the far-right towards law enforcement" - @petestrzok w/ @NicolleDWallace https://t.co/LU95Xnc1yE2:36 AM ∙ Jan 7, 20234,295Likes1,383Retweetshttps://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/01/07/mccarthy-speaker-election-lessons/
Victor Shi @Victorshi2020The real hero from this last week is this woman: Cheryl Johnson, the second Black person to ever be the Clerk of the House. She oversaw the entire Republican circus with nothing but dignity, composure, and grace. America thanks you, Cheryl Johnson. 
11:24 PM ∙ Jan 7, 202314,448Likes1,704Retweetshttps://www.cbsnews.com/news/kevin-mccarthy-house-speaker-multiple-ballots-history/
Aaron Rupar @atruparMcCarthy going out of his way to gush over Trump at a time when his influence is clearly diminished & political brand is more toxic to mainstream voters than ever - especially on the anniversary of the insurrection - is notable & indicative of who he'll be beholden to as speaker 
Acyn @AcynMcCarthy: But I do want to thank especially President Trump. I don’t think anybody should doubt his influence. https://t.co/UJdVKQ5VRA5:35 PM ∙ Jan 7, 20233,645Likes772Retweetshttps://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/06/us/south-carolina-gerrymandering.html
https://www.axios.com/2023/01/07/kevin-mccarthy-speech-new-seaker-trump-and-biden
https://speakai.co/republican-kevin-mccarthys-house-speaker-acceptance-speech/
January 6, 2023
Two years ago today, rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol to stop the counting of electoral ballots that would put a Democrat in the White House. There was no doubt Joe Biden had won: his majority in the popular vote was more than 7 million and he won the electoral college by 306 votes to 232, the same margin that the incumbent Republican had called a “landslide” four years earlier when it favored him. But supporters of that incumbent, Donald Trump, believed that Democrats could not possibly have won fairly and that if they had, it simply meant their voters were illegitimate.
Their worldview had its roots in opposition to the New Deal of the 1930s when Democrats, led by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, created a new kind of government in the United States, one in which the government worked to level the playing field between workers and employers and to provide a basic social safety net. Their new government included—imperfectly, but included—Black and Brown Americans and women. And it paid for the new programs with higher taxes on the wealthy.
When the new system shored up the economy, preserved democracy, and enabled the U.S. to help destroy European fascism, most Americans—Republicans as well as Democrats—supported the new system. Over time, they expanded it, and they also began to use the government to protect civil rights. The shared belief in this active government became known as the “liberal consensus” and was so popular that most Americans never imagined it might be dismantled. Social Security, for example, the Voting Rights Act, and the Environmental Protection Agency were all simply part of the air we breathed.
But from the start, those who hated the New Deal argued that it was essentially socialism because it took money from wealthy people and redistributed it through government programs to poorer Americans, especially Black people, people of color, and women. They warned white men that they were losing control of the country as they were being outvoted by lazy minorities and demanding women.
Gradually, those people who wanted to go back to the world of the 1920s took over the Republican Party. They purged it of those Republicans who believed in the liberal consensus, calling them “RINOs,” or Republicans in name only, even though it was Republicans who had put in place many of the crucial pieces of the liberal consensus, including the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
As the old racist wing of the Democratic Party, those who hated civil rights laws, swung to the Republicans, the Democrats increasingly became the party of minorities and women, and they defended the laws that had made the government more responsive to the needs of all Americans. As they did so, Republicans, determined to destroy the liberal consensus, turned the generic word “liberal” into something close to “communist,” which actually refers to someone who believes the government should take over the means of production.
They worked to convince voters that Democrats were leftists using the government to steal from hardworking white men, and warned that letting them have a say in the government would destroy the country. When voters still elected Democrats, Republicans started to manipulate the electoral system, restricting the vote and gerrymandering districts. After 1993, when Democrats made it easier for people to vote by enabling them to register at their local Department of Motor Vehicles and other government offices, Republicans began to insist—without any evidence—that Democrats won only because they cheated.
The attack on the U.S. Capitol was the logical outcome of this rhetoric. The rioters believed they were saving the country from what Trump called “emboldened radical-left Democrats” who had stolen the election. They believed they were patriots defending the country and the Constitution from Democrats, whose policies, Trump told them, “chipped away our jobs, weakened our military, threw open our borders, and put America last.” Biden would be an “illegitimate president,” “voted on by a bunch of stupid people.” “[Y]ou'll never take back our country with weakness,” Trump told them. “You have to show strength and you have to be strong…. We fight like hell. And if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore.”
The rioters did not act alone. They were aided and encouraged by radicalized Republican leaders who had bought into the idea that the liberal consensus must be destroyed. Late on the night of January 6, 2021, after the riot, 147 Republican members of Congress voted to contest the slates of electors, reinforcing the idea that the election was fraudulent, although they knew as well as anyone that election officials, judges, and even Trump’s own campaign and White House staff had dismissed those claims.
After the insurrection, Republican leaders—including House minority leader Kevin McCarthy of California—initially condemned those who participated in it, but quickly came around to protect those who had simply taken their own ideology to its logical extreme.
And now, two years later, voter suppression and gerrymandering have enabled their voters to give those same people control of the House of Representatives, where their quest to dismantle the liberal consensus has been on display. Twenty of the most extreme Republicans refused to back McCarthy for House speaker until he gave them enough power essentially to make up a third bloc in the House. McCarthy could easily have reached out to the Democrats rather than cave to the extremist right, but he refused to compromise the quest to get rid of the very legislation the Democrats—and most Americans—want.
Today saw the number of House roll call votes for speaker rack up to an astonishing 14, as McCarthy gave the extremists more and more power. By midnight, after the 14th failed vote had led Mike Rogers of North Carolina to lunge at extremist ringleader Matt Gaetz of Florida, it was clear McCarthy’s bargaining would win him the seat he so badly wanted in a 15th ballot early the next day. Scott Perry (R-PA), who was a key figure in the attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election, told CNN’s Manu Raju that among the many promises McCarthy made to get them on board was that he would not agree to raise the national debt limit without significant concessions.
The extremists wanted this control because they seem to believe that if the U.S. stops funding the government, the programs they hate will die. To kill off the government built by the liberal consensus, they are threatening to do as Trump has advocated: take the government into default.
That is, a few extremists are willing to take our government hostage to get their way, just as extremists did on January 6, 2021.
On that day the rioters attacked law enforcement officers, hunted down elected officials, and smeared feces in the building that symbolizes self-government in order to overturn an election and overthrow our right to choose our leaders, the principle that sits at the heart of democracy, and they did it believing that they were the ones defending America. “We have overwhelming pride in this great country,” Trump told them. “Together, we are determined to defend and preserve government of the people, by the people, and for the people.”
But they were not the ones defending democracy that day. Those defending democracy were the law enforcement officers who held back the mob even at the cost of their health and even their lives, people like Daniel Hodges, Michael Fanone, Harry Dunn, Caroline Edwards, Aquilino Gonell, Eugene Goodman, Howard Liebengood, Jeffrey Smith, Billy Evans, and Brian D. Sicknick.
Those defending democracy were the election workers who protected our system even at the cost of their jobs, their safety, and their peace of mind, people like Ruby Freeman, Shaye Moss, and Albert Schmidt. They were elected officials who refused to cave to pressure to throw the election, people like Jocelyn Benson and Rusty Bowers.
When Biden awarded these fifteen people the Presidential Citizens Medal today, he reminded the audience that on this day in 1941, FDR delivered the famous “Four Freedoms” speech.
In that speech, FDR told the country that “The nation takes…much strength from the things which have been done to make its people conscious of their individual stake in the preservation of democratic life in America. Those things have toughened the fiber of our people, have renewed their faith and strengthened their devotion to the institutions we make ready to protect.”
—
Notes:
Tom Nichols @RadioFreeTomAll these guys are in the *same party* 
The Associated Press @APAs tensions boiled over on the House floor during the speaker votes, Republican Mike Rogers of Alabama started to charge toward Matt Gaetz before Richard Hudson physically pulled him back.Full coverage:https://t.co/rT1rrJ7Ayy https://t.co/klMbHN02iV5:20 AM ∙ Jan 7, 2023830Likes190Retweets
Josh Marshall @joshtpmTHERE IT IS: McCarthy agreed to give Freedom Caucus the keys to the car on pushing for national debt default. 6:34 PM ∙ Jan 6, 20238,224Likes3,442Retweetshttps://www.npr.org/2021/02/10/966396848/read-trumps-jan-6-speech-a-key-part-of-impeachment-trial
January 5, 2023
January 5, 2023
After 11 ballots, the Republicans remain unable to elect a speaker and thus unable to organize the House.
After passing comprehensive laws on a wide range of issues with a similarly small House majority under Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) during the last Congress, the Democrats remain united behind Hakeem Jeffries. They have delivered 212 votes for him 11 times.
The contrast is stark.
Throughout the day, the allies of Republican leader Kevin McCarthy (CA) negotiated with the 20 extremists who refuse to back him, apparently offering them more and more power to win their votes. McCarthy has allegedly agreed to their demand that a single person can force a vote to get rid of the speaker, a demand that puts him at their mercy and that he had previously insisted he would never accept. He has also apparently offered members of the hard-right Freedom Caucus two spots on the House Rules Committee, which decides how measures will be presented to the House, and given them control over appropriations bills. He is also said to be considering letting them choose committee chairs, jumping over those with seniority.
This will not sit well with the rest of the conference. Lawyer and Washington Post columnist George Conway wrote, “I’m no political scientist, but it does strike me that a guy who negotiates by giving stuff up and and getting nothing in return probably wouldn’t make a good leader of a legislative body.”
If McCarthy does eventually win the speakership, he will have empowered a small group of extremists to control the House, and the next two years will be a constant fight as this tiny minority can hamstring the government. One of the extremists, Ralph Norman (R-SC), who wanted Trump to declare martial law in 2021 in order to retain the White House, said that McCarthy will get his vote only if he agrees not to raise the debt ceiling and will instead shut down the government and default on the national debt.
Bulwark podcast host Charlie Sykes told Alex Wagner Tonight, “There is no Republican establishment…. [W]hoever becomes the speaker is going to preside over the chaos that has been building for years. He or she is going to be the mayor of Crazytown.”
As the Republicans look incompetent and irresponsible, and will almost certainly make sure nothing much gets done in the 118th Congress, President Joe Biden is working to make sure people understand just how much the Democrats got done in the past two years.
At a cabinet meeting today, he told reporters that the country has made real progress and that the administration is now focusing on implementing the recently passed “big laws” so Americans feel the benefits of them. He noted that the $35 cap on the cost of insulin for those on Medicare went into effect only this year, along with other medical benefits like free vaccines for Medicare recipients. He also pointed out new tax credits for making homes energy efficient, and noted that government officials need to get the message out that the laws are out there.
Biden talked about both public and private investment in manufacturing, which will create jobs, and his conviction that the administration’s approach to building the economy from the bottom up is “off to a pretty darn good start.”
In a later set of remarks, the president and Vice President Kamala Harris explained that with Republicans having scuttled the bipartisan agreement on revising immigration laws that senators were working on in the last Congress, the administration is also stepping up to address the influx of migrants to the border. Today it announced new measures.
Biden explained that, currently, Cubans, Nicaraguans, Venezuelans, and Haitians make up a large percentage of those trying to come to the U.S. across the southern border, while the patchwork system of different rules at the border, along with the lack of asylum officers, means the system is broken. Former president Trump used Title 42, the public health rule, at the start of the pandemic to reject most migrants, but that rule imposes no penalties on those trying repeatedly to get into the country, significantly inflating the numbers of people apprehended at the border.
So, until Congress passes a comprehensive immigration plan to fix the system completely, the administration is working to stiffen enforcement for those who come to the U.S. without a legal right to stay, and also to speed up the process for those who do have that right. Those seeking asylum can use an app to request a humanitarian exemption to Title 42, and once the rule is lifted, can use the app “to schedule a time to present themselves at a port of entry for inspection and processing, rather than arriving unannounced at a port of entry or attempting to cross in-between ports of entry.”
Others can apply for admission if they have a U.S. sponsor, and then pass a background check, at which point they can enter the U.S. to work legally for two years. The U.S. will welcome 30,000 people a month from these four countries. But here’s the kicker: if they try to enter the U.S. without that paperwork, they are barred from entry in the future.
Since the U.S. applied this program to Venezuelans in October, undocumented crossings of Venezuelans have dropped about 90%. The administration is now expanding the program to include people from Cuba, Nicaragua, and Haiti.
Immediately after Biden spoke, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas followed up. He began by refuting the Republican refrain that Biden’s attempt to end Title 42 will mean open borders, reiterating that “Title 42 or not, the border is not open.”
He provided some statistics on a system he calls “broken, outdated, and in desperate need of reform.” Currently, he explained, “It takes four or more years to conclude the average asylum case, immigration judges have a backlog of more than 1.7 million cases, and we have more than 11 million undocumented people in our country, many of whom work in the shadows, pay taxes, are our neighbors, attend our places of worship, work on the frontlines, and farm the food on our tables.” Once again, he begged Congress to update our immigration laws.
On Sunday, Biden will go to El Paso, Texas, to meet with local officials and community leaders to hear what they say they need, make it public, and try to convince Republicans to do something about it, rather than using the immigration issue as a political cudgel.
When asked why he is going now, when for two years Republicans have been demanding that he go, Biden made it clear he did not intend to respond to political stunts and wanted a visit to be tied to the impending end of Title 42. But there is no doubt this is an excellent political moment to respond to the Republicans’ drumbeat complaints that Biden is ignoring a border crisis.
Tomorrow, on January 6, Biden will honor people who distinguished themselves by protecting the country during the 2020–2021 attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election, awarding them the Presidential Citizens Medal, the second-highest civilian award in the United States. Recipients include Capitol Police and law enforcement officers, election workers, and elected officials who withstood pressure to lie for Trump.
One of those getting a medal, posthumously, is U.S. Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, who died on January 7, 2021, after a series of strokes. Today, Sicknick’s estate asked for $10 million in damages from former president Trump, suing him for assault, negligence, violating Sicknick’s civil rights, and wrongful death, saying Trump incited the violence of January 6 that contributed to Sicknick’s death.
And on that note, two years after the January 6th insurrection, it is notable that Trump’s name has barely been mentioned during the fight over the House speakership. After McCarthy had lost three ballots, Trump urged the 20 extremists, some of whom have been his staunchest supporters, to “VOTE FOR KEVIN, CLOSE THE DEAL, TAKE THE VICTORY.” They ignored him. And for all the threats that the Republicans would make Trump himself House speaker, so far he has gotten just one vote.
—
Notes:
@POTUS Biden to award the Presidential Citizens Medal on Friday to the following individuals during an event marking the 2nd anniversary of the #January6thInsurrection ","username":"edokeefe","name":"Ed O'Keefe","date":"Thu Jan 05 15:31:36 +0000 2023","photos":[{"img_url":"https://pbs.substack.com/media/FluAdk...
Ed O'Keefe @edokeefeJUST IN: @POTUS Biden to award the Presidential Citizens Medal on Friday to the following individuals during an event marking the 2nd anniversary of the #January6thInsurrection 
3:31 PM ∙ Jan 5, 202312,298Likes3,195Retweetshttps://www.politico.com/news/2023/01/04/trump-endorses-mccarthy-speaker-house-00076298
Duty To Warn 🔉 @duty2warnRep. Ralph Norman said that to win his vote, McCarthy would need to be willing to shut down the government and default on the debt.1:29 AM ∙ Jan 6, 20232,651Likes996Retweetshttps://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/01/05/us/house-speaker-vote
@SykesCharlie cautions that \"whoever becomes the speaker is going to preside over the chaos that has been building for years. He or she is going to be the mayor of Crazytown.\" ","username":"WagnerTonight","name":"Alex Wagner Tonight","date":"Thu Jan 05 23:25:55 +0000 2023","photos":[{"img_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/upload/...
Alex Wagner Tonight @WagnerTonight"There is no Republican establishment. There are no normies." @SykesCharlie cautions that "whoever becomes the speaker is going to preside over the chaos that has been building for years. He or she is going to be the mayor of Crazytown." 11:25 PM ∙ Jan 5, 20231,117Likes290Retweetshttps://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-capitol-police-officers-family-sues-trump-over-death-2023-01-06/
George Conway🌻 @gtconway3dI'm no political scientist, but it does strike me that a guy who negotiates by giving stuff up and and getting nothing in return probably wouldn't make a good leader of a legislative body6:22 PM ∙ Jan 5, 202349,209Likes5,753Retweets
January 4, 2023
January 4, 2023
The Republicans won a narrow majority in the House of Representatives in 2022—aided by gerrymandering and new laws that made it harder to vote—but they remain unable to come together to elect a speaker. In three ballots yesterday, Republican leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) could not muster a majority of the House to back him, as a group of 20 far-right Republicans are backing their own choices. The saga continued today with three more ballots; McCarthy still came up short.
In contrast, the Democrats have consistently given minority leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York 212 votes, more votes than McCarthy received but not a majority of the body. When former Speaker Nancy Pelosi nominated Jeffries yesterday, she blew him a kiss and the caucus rose up in a standing ovation.
Because it is still unorganized, the House technically has no members. No one is sworn in, and so they cannot perform their official duties or hire staff. About 70 new members brought their families to Washington, D.C., to watch their swearing in, and the extra days as the speakership contest drags on are becoming hard to manage.
The chaos suggests that Republican leadership does not have the skills it needs to govern. Leaders often have to negotiate in order to take power—Nancy Pelosi had to bring together a number of factions to win the speakership in 2019—but since 1923 those negotiations have been completed before the start of voting.
Just weeks ago, McCarthy and his supporters were furious at Senate Republicans for negotiating with their Democratic colleagues to pass the omnibus bill to fund the government, insisting they could do a better job. Now they can’t even agree on a speaker. “Thank God they weren’t in the majority on January 6,” Pelosi told reporters, “because that was the day you had to be organized to stave off what was happening, to save our democracy, to certify the election of the president.”
One story here is about competence. Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo points out that Pelosi ran the House with virtually the same margin the Republicans have now and yet managed to hold her caucus together tightly enough to pass a slate of legislation that rivaled those of the Great Society and the New Deal. McCarthy can’t even organize the House, leaving the United States without a functioning Congress for the first time in a hundred years.
But there is a larger story here about the destruction of the traditional Republican Party over the past forty years. In those years, a party that believed the government had a role to play in leveling the country’s economic and racial playing fields was captured by a reactionary right wing determined to uproot any such government action. When voters—including Republicans—continued to support business regulation, a basic social safety net, and civil rights laws, the logical outcome of opposition to such measures was war on the government itself.
That war is not limited to the 20 far-right Republicans refusing to elect McCarthy speaker. Pundits note that those 20 have supported former president Trump’s positions, particularly the Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen. They also worked to overturn the 2020 election, challenging the electors from a number of states. But 139 Republicans, including McCarthy himself, voted in 2021 to challenge electors from a number of states and went on to embrace the Big Lie, and McCarthy’s staunchest supporter is extremist Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia.
And today, more than 60 prominent right-wing figures, from President Ronald Reagan’s attorney general Edwin Meese III to Trump lawyers Cleta Mitchell and John Eastman, who were both instrumental in the effort to overturn Biden’s election in 2020, and Justice Clarence Thomas’s wife Ginni Thomas, who also participated in that effort, declared themselves “disgusted with the business-as-usual, self-interested governance in Washington.” They declared their support for the 20.
The roots of today’s Republican worldview lie in the Reagan Revolution of 1980.
Reagan and his allies sought to dismantle the regulation of business and the social welfare state that cost tax dollars, but they recognized those policies were popular. So they fell back on an old Reconstruction era trope, arguing that social welfare programs and regulation were a form of socialism because they cost tax dollars that were paid primarily by white men while their benefits went to poor Americans, primarily Black people or people of color. In that formula, first articulated by former Confederates after the Civil War, minority voting was a form of socialism that would destroy America.
When Reagan used this argument, he emphasized its idea of economic individualism over its racism, but that racism was definitely there, and many of his supporters heard it. When he stood about seven miles from Philadelphia, Mississippi, where Ku Klux Klan members had murdered civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner just 16 years before as they tried to register Black people to vote, and said “I believe in states’ rights,” the racist wing of the old Democratic Party knew what he meant and voted for him.
In the years since, party leaders cut taxes and deregulated business while rallying voters with warnings that government policies that regulated business, provided a social safety net, or protected civil rights were socialism that redistributed white tax dollars to minorities. In the 1990s, under the leadership of House speaker Newt Gingrich, Chamber of Commerce lawyer Grover Norquist, and talk radio host Rush Limbaugh, the party purged from its ranks traditional Republicans, replacing them with ideological fellow travelers.
As their policies threatened to lose voters by concentrating wealth upward and hollowing out the middle class, Republicans increasingly warned that minority voters wanted socialism and were destroying the nation to get it. Trump rode that narrative to power, and now tearing down the current government is the idea that drives the Republican base.
Just last night, in his apparent realization that the party is moving beyond him, Trump launched a new attack on Black Georgia election worker Ruby Freeman, falsely accusing her once again of delivering suitcases of fraudulent ballots in the 2020 presidential election to steal victory from him. Trump said he is fighting “the evils and treachery of the Radical Left monsters who want to see America die.”
That Republicans now have a wing openly determined to destroy the federal government is not a function of a few outliers who have wormed their way into Congress; it is the logical outcome of this worldview. Lawmakers like Matt Gaetz (R-FL) and Lauren Boebert (R-CO) are clearly enjoying the power they are currently wielding, but their larger project is the one the party has advertised since they were children: stopping the government from any of the actions it has called “Marxist” or “socialist,” burning it all down to make white Americans free.
Destruction doesn’t take skill at governance; it only requires obstruction. The 20 are good at that.
But a new era is pushing the Reagan era aside. Plenty of Republicans who want to deregulate business and cut taxes recognize that it is our democratic government and the rule of law that protects their investments, and that maintaining the government will take basic laws and the skills to negotiate and pass them.
At the same time, after two years of Democratic control, Americans have seen that government can work for them, and they appear to like the new laws that have created jobs—including in manufacturing—and invested in social services and are rebuilding infrastructure. Republicans who want to get reelected are moving away from the extremists to take credit for the laws passed under the Democrats. Just today, Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Ohio governor Mike DeWine, and former Ohio senator Rob Portman—all Republicans—joined President Joe Biden, Democratic governor of Kentucky Andy Beshear, and Democratic Ohio senator Sherrod Brown in Covington, Kentucky, to visit the Brent Spence Bridge between Covington and Cincinnati, Ohio. The bridge is on one of the country’s busiest freight corridors and is being rebuilt with money from the bipartisan infrastructure law passed in 2021.
In Ohio yesterday, Jason Stephens, a Republican promising to stop far-right policies, joined with Democrats to snatch the speaker’s chair from a far-right Republican who focused on religion and opposing abortion rights and who believed he had sewn up the necessary votes in his party. A Democratic state representative told Morgan Trau of ABC News, “Speaker Stephens led a coalition of moderate lawmakers from across the aisle, who will now focus on delivering the common sense solutions that Ohioans sent us here to deliver…. Now we can work on investing in our communities, on public education and workforce development.”
—
Notes:
Josh Marshall @joshtpmWorth remembering: Nancy Pelosi just ran the House for two years with the exact same margin. She not only easily commanded the Speakership but passed a lot of legislation. Part of this is that the Dems are not the GOP. The radicalism and propensity for parliamentary ...5:44 PM ∙ Jan 3, 20239,946Likes1,562Retweetshttps://www.vox.com/2021/1/6/22218058/republicans-objections-election-results
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/01/07/us/elections/electoral-college-biden-objectors.html
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/02/nancy-pelosi-voted-house-speaker-as-democrats-take-majority.html
Lalee Ibssa @LaleeIbssa“None of us has seen anything like this disrespect for the institution in a most cavalier, frivolous way. It’s quite sad,” Pelosi said.“But let’s be hopeful that in the next day or so as they find their purpose and their unity, they understand why they are here.” 2:35 AM ∙ Jan 5, 202310,891Likes1,953Retweetsabcn.ws/3GEAFat ","username":"ABC","name":"ABC News","date":"Wed Jan 04 16:47:13 +0000 2023","photos":[{"img_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/upload/...
ABC News @ABCAmid multiple failed House speaker votes, former Speaker Nancy Pelosi says "thank God" Republicans weren't in the majority on Jan. 6 — "because that was the day you had to be organized to stave off what was happening." abcn.ws/3GEAFat 4:47 PM ∙ Jan 4, 202310,464Likes2,264Retweets
The Tennessee Holler @TheTNHollerPELOSI: “Happily, the honorable Hakeem Jeffries.”Pelosi graciously votes for Jeffries for speaker and blows him a kiss — gets an ovation. A peaceful transfer of power that must look very foreign to the GOP. 6:32 PM ∙ Jan 3, 202314,142Likes2,461Retweetshttps://www.cnn.com/2023/01/04/politics/biden-kentucky-infrastructure-wednesday/index.html
https://conservativeactionproject.com/conservatives-call-for-new-house-leadership/
January 3, 2023
January 3, 2023
Today, the Republicans took over the House of Representatives.
The first thing they did was to remove the metal detectors that were installed after the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. The removal was one of the things Republican leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) promised far-right Republicans in hopes of winning their votes to elect him speaker. The House has not yet voted on the rules package that ends "Democrat fines for failure of Members to comply with unscientific mask mandates and security screenings before entering the House floor," but the metal detectors are gone, just three days before the second anniversary of the January 6 attack.
So far, the removal of those metal detectors is the only concrete outcome of McCarthy’s attempt to woo the extremist members of his conference.
McCarthy failed today to win the House speakership. For the first time since 1923, the speaker was not decided on the first ballot.
The reason for the failure is that the Republican conference in the House is feuding internally. On the one hand are the extremists who maintain the reason the Republicans lost ground in the last three elections is that party leadership has not gone far enough in dismantling the government. They are led by lawmakers who were key in former president Trump’s attempt to overthrow the 2020 election, men like Scott Perry (R-PA), Andy Biggs (R-AZ), and Jim Jordan (R-OH). “I stand firmly committed to changing the status quo no matter how many ballots this takes,” Perry tweeted. “If…McCarthy had fought nearly as hard to defeat the failed, toxic policies of the…Biden Administration as he has for himself, he would be Speaker of the House right now.”
Politico’s Heidi Przybyla recalled that in his 2021 memoir, former Republican speaker John Boehner said of this faction: “What they’re really interested in is chaos.… They want to throw sand in the gears of the hated federal government until it fails and they’ve finally proved that it’s beyond saving.” And they are tied tightly to right-wing media: “Every time they vote down a bill, they get another invitation to go on Fox News or talk radio,” he said. “Its a narcissistic—and dangerous—feedback loop.”
On the other hand are Republicans like the one who spoke to CNN’s Jake Tapper last night, saying that the holdouts want “procedural trickery that no one in America gives a damn about, but that might give these few loudmouths just a little bit more of the attention and power they crave…. None of these narcissists—and that’s what they are, pure narcissists—did a damn thing to help us win the majority. Nothing. If anything, many of them were liabilities, requiring outside help from Kevin McCarthy, ironically. So they contribute nothing to the team, and then have the audacity to demand outsize influence and power.”
The statement is important; equally important is that the source wanted to stay anonymous.
Before today, there were plenty of signs McCarthy did not have the votes he needed to become speaker. About five extremists had made it clear they would not vote for him, and another bloc of about nine Republicans had waffled. McCarthy tried to bluster his way through the uncertainty, beginning the process of moving into the speaker’s office last night.
But as former White House press secretary Jen Psaki tweeted: “politics 101 rule—avoid going into a vote not knowing if you have the votes….” McCarthy revealed that he had not mastered that rule when the House began to vote. It turned out that he was down not just the five promised “no” votes, but a full 19 votes as extremists threw their support to members who share their ideology. Meanwhile, the Democrats united around Representative Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), the House minority leader.
The results of the first ballot had Jeffries in the lead with 212 votes and McCarthy second with 203; Representative Andy Biggs (R-AZ), who was part of the effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election, had ten votes. Nine votes went to miscellaneous others.
A second ballot again saw Jeffries and McCarthy at 212 and 203 respectively. But extremists concentrated around Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH), giving him 19 votes.
A third ballot had Jeffries holding steady at 212, while McCarthy dropped a vote to stand at 202. Jordan picked up that vote to stand at 20. A dropping vote is never a good sign for a frontrunner.
And with that, the House adjourned about 5:30 p.m., sending representatives off to negotiate behind closed doors.
At stake is the direction of the Republican Party. While extremists blame their recent losses on the leadership that will not, they insist, go far enough, observers note that Republicans have lost voters who see the party as far to the right of the mainstream. Moving the party farther right is the last thing less extreme Republicans want, especially those 18 new Republican representatives from districts President Joe Biden won in 2020. An extremist House speaker will almost certainly kill their careers as two years of headlines feature members like Lauren Boebert (R-CO) lecturing and Jim Jordan yelling.
So, as McCarthy’s bid for speaker bogs down, the question is whether they will accept the extremist Jordan—who is deeply implicated in the January 6, 2021, attempt to overthrow the 2020 presidential election—as speaker, or whether they will work to find a compromise candidate by working either with Democrats or with Republicans who regroup around someone who isn’t Jordan. Former Republican governor of Ohio John Kasich has already called on House Republicans to work with Democrats “to pick a speaker to run a coalition government, which will moderate the House and marginalize the extremists.”
But which way they will go is unclear. As congressional reporter for Punchbowl News Max Cohen reported tonight, the Republicans still have to defer to their media for direction. Representative Guy Reschenthaler (R-PA), who expects to be in the House leadership, said of the 19 voters who swung to Jordan: “We’ll see what happens when Tucker and Sean Hannity and Ben Shapiro start beating up on these guys. Maybe that'll move it.”
As for the man who sparked this meltdown, NBC’s Garrett Haake tweeted an exclusive story: “Former President Trump declined to say if he's sticking by his endorsement of Kevin McCarthy for speaker tonight, telling me in a brief phone interview he's had calls all day asking for support, and ‘We'll see what happens. We'll see how it all works out.’”
People are comparing this multiple-ballot contest to that of 1923, when Progressive Republicans forced incumbent speaker Frederick Gillett, a Republican, to accept rules changes that gave them more power before they would put him back in office. Perhaps more instructive, though, was the speaker’s contest of 1855–1856, when a struggle over the future of the country created shifting coalitions that crossed party lines until, after two months and 133 ballots, representatives put Nathaniel Banks, who had ties to most of the different factions, in the speaker’s chair.
Conspicuously excluded from the talking and visiting on the House floor today was newly-elected George Santos (R-NY), whose lies about his education, employment, financing, and so on would lead any healthy political party to demand an investigation of him before he took office. In this case, though, his vote for McCarthy was too important to pass up, so he sat shunned by his colleagues, alone and silent, except when called on to vote.
The House Democrats, meanwhile, organized without a hitch, putting together a leadership team that consists of Hakeem Jeffries (NY), Katherine Clark (MA), and Pete Aguilar (CA). With quite a bit of enthusiasm, the Democrats voted as a bloc to give Jeffries more votes than McCarthy, whose party is in the majority.
The Senate, too, organized easily and with what looked like a good deal of fun. Vice President Kamala Harris swore in the senators, then chatted with families and posed for pictures.
Tonight, Representative Matt Gaetz (R-FL) wrote to the Architect of the Capitol complaining that McCarthy had occupied the office of the House speaker without having been elected. “How long will he remain there before he is considered a squatter?” Gaetz asked. “Please write back promptly as it seems Mr. McCarthy can no longer be considered Speaker-Designate following today’s balloting.”
The first day of Republican control of the House of Representatives does not bode well for the next two years.
—
Notes:
https://www.axios.com/2023/01/03/house-gop-removes-metal-detectors-jan-6
@GOPLeader McCarthy’s GOP detractors: ","username":"jaketapper","name":"Jake Tapper","date":"Tue Jan 03 00:05:54 +0000 2023","photos":[{"img_url":"https://pbs.substack.com/media/FlgZeK...
Jake Tapper @jaketapperHouse Republican Member of Congress goes off against @GOPLeader McCarthy’s GOP detractors: 
12:05 AM ∙ Jan 3, 20234,160Likes849Retweets
Garrett Haake @GarrettHaakeEXCLUSIVE: Former President Trump declined to say if he's sticking by his endorsement of Kevin McCarthy for speaker tonight, telling me in a brief phone interview he's had calls all day asking for support, and "We'll see what happens. We'll see how it all works out."10:52 PM ∙ Jan 3, 20238,157Likes1,759Retweets
Max Cohen @maxpcohenRep. Guy Reschenthaler, who’s poised to be chief deputy whip, on what could possibly swing the 19 Jordan voters: “We’ll see what happens when Tucker and Sean Hannity and Ben Shapiro start beating up on these guys. Maybe that'll move it.”8:46 PM ∙ Jan 3, 20232,975Likes523Retweetshttps://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/new-congress-sworn-in-2023/index.html
https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/03/politics/house-speaker-vote-mccarthy/index.html
https://www.rawstory.com/kevin-mccarthy-john-boehner/
@SpeakerBoehner's 2021 memoir (on the modern) party offers evergreen insight:\n\n\"What they're really interested in is chaos. ...They want to throw sand in the gears of the hated federal government until it fails and they've finally proved that it's beyond saving. 1/","username":"HeidiReports","name":"Heidi Przybyla","date":"Tue Jan 03 21:17:53 +0000 2023","photos":[],"quoted_tweet":{},"retweet_count":841,"like_count":2889,"expanded_url":{},"video_url":null,"belowTheFold":true}">
Heidi Przybyla @HeidiReportsThis from @SpeakerBoehner's 2021 memoir (on the modern) party offers evergreen insight:"What they're really interested in is chaos. ...They want to throw sand in the gears of the hated federal government until it fails and they've finally proved that it's beyond saving. 1/9:17 PM ∙ Jan 3, 20232,889Likes841Retweets
John Kasich @JohnKasichA block of House Republicans should get together with Democrats to pick a speaker to run a coalition government, which will moderate the House and marginalize the extremists.6:48 PM ∙ Jan 3, 202354,980Likes7,212Retweets@VP is a whole mood today 😂😂 really missed her💕 ","username":"kamalaharrisus1","name":"kamalaharris.usa•Selin💜💛","date":"Tue Jan 03 21:01:44 +0000 2023","photos":[{"img_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/upload/...
kamalaharris.usa•Selin💜💛 @kamalaharrisus1@VP is a whole mood today 😂😂 really missed her💕 9:01 PM ∙ Jan 3, 20231,670Likes295Retweets
Jen Psaki @jrpsakipolitics 101 rule--avoid going into a vote not knowing if you have the votes...5:54 PM ∙ Jan 3, 202371,949Likes6,418Retweets
Matt Gaetz @mattgaetzI’d like to report a squatter 
Juliegrace Brufke @juliegracebGaetz sent a letter to the Architect of the Capitol questioning why McCarthy is allowed to occupy the Speaker’s office. https://t.co/gOlXOtlHQj2:52 AM ∙ Jan 4, 202312,114Likes2,263Retweets
January 2, 2023
January 2, 2023
Members are gathering in Washington for tomorrow’s organization of the 118th Congress. The opening of a new Congress is always an exciting time, and this year is particularly interesting.
It appears that House minority leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) still does not have the votes to become speaker when the Republicans take the majority tomorrow, although he has made significant concessions to the 15 or so far-right members who refuse to back him.
He has agreed to make it a great deal easier for members of the House to throw out the speaker, a concession that will put him at the mercy of the far right, and a concession that he vowed he would never make. He has agreed to put more of the extreme right members on committees, and he has said he will create a select committee to investigate the “weaponization of government against our citizens.”
He has agreed to cuts to the Office of Congressional Ethics and to forcing the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol to turn over all of its documents to the Committee on House Administration, rather than the National Archives, which has sparked concerns that Republican members will reveal the identities of national security personnel who testified before the committee.
And yet, it seems the more he concedes, the weaker he looks. On Saturday night, nine members of the far-right congressional delegation, many of whom are implicated in the January 6, 2021, attempt to overthrow the government, indicated his concessions were still not enough. They issued a letter with the warning: “Time to make the change or get out of the way.” The letter complained of “deficiencies” and “dysfunction” and “Republican failures” but was quite vague about what its authors wanted, except perhaps power.
Meanwhile, after it turned out that his campaign biography was entirely made up, Republican representative-elect George Santos of New York is facing investigations into his finances and his citizenship. Today, Brazilian authorities reopened fraud charges against Santos for a 2008 case in which he apparently stole checks from an elderly man. The case had been dormant because authorities had not been able to find Santos. McCarthy and other Republicans have refused to take a stand for or against Santos; his vote for speaker will be crucial. Santos has denied that he committed a crime.
“We’re supposed to be hitting the ground running here, but instead it’s just a big belly flop,” a Republican lawmaker recently told Politico. “Believe me, it’s not just members of the Freedom Caucus who are aggravated. As the days and hours trickle on, the more aggravated people become.”
As the House Republicans’ infighting threatens two chaotic years, the Democratic-controlled Senate will continue to confirm judges who reject the extremism of the Trump-era appointees, working to restore balance and representation in the judicial system. In the first two years of the Biden administration, the Senate confirmed 97 federal judges. Seventy-four have been women—more female judges than the Senate confirmed in Trump’s four years or in George W. Bush’s eight.
The Supreme Court will be harder to rebalance because of Trump’s three appointments, made possible by the refusal of then–Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) to move forward President Barack Obama’s nominee in March 2016 with the argument that it was too close to a presidential election, and then his rushing through of Amy Coney Barrett in late October 2020 after voting in the presidential election had already started.
While the House struggles and the Senate focuses on judges, President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris and members of the administration will greet 2023 by traveling around the country highlighting what the laws passed in the last two years will mean for Americans.
In that effort, they will be joined by leading Republicans, in what amounts to a rebuke of their far-right colleagues. On Wednesday, January 4, Biden will be in Kentucky with McConnell, Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Governor Andy Beshear (D-KY), and Governor Mike DeWine (R-OH) to talk about how the bipartisan infrastructure law is rebuilding the country, providing jobs that don’t need a four-year college degree. Harris will be in Chicago doing the same; Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg will be in New London, Connecticut; then-former House speaker Nancy Pelosi will be in San Francisco.
The January 6th committee continued to release transcripts over the holiday weekend. Journalists examining those transcripts have uncovered important new information.
Among that information is that an email on January 2, 2021, from January 6 rally organizer Katrina Pierson shows that Trump’s invitation to supporters to march on the Capitol was not spontaneous; it was part of the plan. By January 2, people knew that Trump would urge his followers to march to the Capitol. To another organizer, Pierson wrote: “POTUS expectations are to have something intimate at the ellipse, and call on everyone to march to the capitol. This actually works out, because Ali [Alexander]’s group is already setting up at the Capitol, and SCOTUS is on the way.”
After the riot of January 6, Trump advisor Hope Hicks exchanged horrified texts with Julie Radford, Ivanka Trump’s chief of staff, bemoaning that the Trump family was now “royally f*cked.” “In one day, he ended every future opportunity that doesn’t include speaking engagements at the local proud boy’s chapter,” Hicks wrote, “And all of us that didn’t have jobs lined up will be perpetually unemployed…. I’m so mad and upset. We all look like domestic terrorists now.” “Not being dramatic, but we are all f*cked,” she wrote.
Conservative Atlantic columnist Tom Nichols tweeted: “Their concern for the Constitution they swore to uphold is so touching.”
—-
Notes:
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/29/politics/kevin-mccarthy-house-speaker-bid/index.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/01/02/kevin-mccarthy-speaker-house-vote/
https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/01/politics/mccarthy-key-concession-speakership-race/index.html
Jake Sherman @JakeShermanNEW: On House GOP call, Kevin McCarthy said that he has given in on the motion to vacate -- the no-confidence motion allows members to boot the speaker.This is something he had indicated he would never do.10:30 PM ∙ Jan 1, 202312,306Likes2,169Retweetsgovinfo.gov/collection/jan… ","username":"hugolowell","name":"Hugo Lowell","date":"Sun Jan 01 23:22:57 +0000 2023","photos":[{"img_url":"https://pbs.substack.com/media/FlbGDM...
Hugo Lowell @hugolowellNEW: Jan. 6 committee obtained email from Katrina Pierson showing rally organizers knew by Jan. 2 that Trump would call for people to march to the Capitol — as it releases the underlying evidence it accumulated during the investigation. govinfo.gov/collection/jan… 
11:22 PM ∙ Jan 1, 202315,300Likes5,641Retweetshttps://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/02/nyregion/george-santos-brazil.html
https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/02/politics/january-6-text-messages/index.html
https://www.npr.org/2023/01/02/1146045412/biden-diverse-federal-judges-women-black-appeals-courts
RepScottPerry @RepScottPerryNothing changes when nothing changes, and that must start from the top. Time to make the change or get out of the way. 
3:36 AM ∙ Jan 2, 2023213Likes68Retweetshttps://www.politico.com/newsletters/playbook/2023/01/02/mccarthy-on-the-brink-00076003
Tom Nichols @RadioFreeTom“And all of us that didn’t have jobs lined up will be perpetually unemployed. I’m so mad and upset. We all look like domestic terrorists now.” - Hope HicksTheir concern for the Constitution they swore to uphold is so touching 
The Daily Beast @thedailybeast“I am so done.” https://t.co/9zKMJCnssh5:42 AM ∙ Jan 2, 202311,435Likes2,087Retweets
The Curious Case of the Political Party in the Night-time...
The fight to become House speaker is fascinating on the Republican side, but I’m also watching the Democratic side. Have you noticed that we have heard virtually nothing from the Democrats about it? On the surface, that silence seems to reflect House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s style. She was famous for knowing when to stand back and let the Republicans tear…
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