Republican Defections Continue in Congress
GOP centrists blocked a labor reform bill on Tuesday that would have continued the Trump administration's attack on business regulations, as House Speaker Mike Johnson pretends everything is fine.
House Speaker Mike Johnson could not gain control of his party, as Republican centrists in the House blocked a series of labor bills last night that were backed by the Republican Party at large. The House was set to vote on three Republican-backed, partisan bills designed to further deregulate work hours to the detriment of workers by changing the way work hours are calculated by excluding specific voluntary training sessions.
After holding the vote open on the floor of the US House of Representatives for more than 45 minutes in an effort to persuade Republican holdouts, Republican Speaker Mike Johnson and his leadership team were unable to convince six members of their caucus to fall in line with Trump’s missive. Representatives Rob Bresnahan (R-PA), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), Nick LaLota (R-NY), Riley Moore (R-WV.), Chris Smith (R-NJ), and Jeff Van Drew (R-NJ) all defiantly voted against the first bill that would have resulted in a significant loss of overtime pay for many of their constituents.
Following Johnson’s public failure on the first vote, the Republican Party quickly abandoned all plans to vote on two other labor-related bills, which sought to alter the way overtime pay is calculated by excluding consideration of the value of employer-sponsored coverage of child care or elder care, and modify and expand the definition of a tipped employee to benefit the employer.
Despite a complete inability to corral Republicans on these three critical labor bills, House Speaker Mike Johnson attempted to spin the defeat by stressing miscommunication to the public. “We’re totally in control of the House,” Johnson said. “There [were] a couple of people who had concerns about the bills that were not here earlier today to let us know that.”
As we head deeper into a Midterm Election year with Donald Trump’s approval rating dropping another 16 points, the Republican scramble in the House this week only adds to the weakening public support for the Conservative agenda. Following the recent defection from five other Republicans, who voted with Democrats to pass a resolution last Thursday that would limit Donald Trump’s ability to conduct further attacks against Venezuela, House Republicans appear fractured in several places.
Republicans have also suffered a series of absences, which further threatens their already razor-thin majority. Representative Jim Baird (R-IN) has just returned after recovering from a recent car crash. Representatives Derrick Van Orden (R-WI) and Greg Murphy (R-NC) have also left Washington, DC, for the rest of the week, so when added to the empty seat caused by the recent sudden death of Representative Doug LaMalfa (R-CA), it all adds up to even less room for error for Republicans that they seem unable to overcome.
When added to the ongoing battle Republican leaders are facing to reach a deal with Democrats on the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spending bill following the ICE shooting of Renee Good, this Republican disarray comes at a tough time for the GOP. Democrats have vowed this week to unite in voting against any DHS funding that fails to put necessary regulations into place that would significantly stunt Trump’s immigration agenda, as it is one of the only options left for progressives, given their numbers in Congress.
Ultimately, the goal for Democrats is to lure Republicans, whose constituents overwhelmingly share the same concerns about funding the DHS bill without new provisions that impose rules on ICE agents, such as requiring them to use body cameras and banning masks. At this point, we have no clear view of which Republican leaders are considering defecting out of concern for their own political careers, but we know that finalizing some form of a deal is important for both sides as we approach another funding deadline at the end of January.
When combined, the embarrassing failure on the House floor yesterday and the impending failure of another Republican spending bill only create more pressure on today’s party-line floor vote intended to advance the State Foreign Operations and Financial Services funding package, which includes a section on supporting “federal, state, and local law enforcement in their efforts to fight drug trafficking and money-laundering.” If we see a repeat today by Republicans of what happened yesterday, complete with Speaker Johnson pretending nothing is wrong, Democrats might finally have some significant leverage in blocking the Conservative agenda.
Amee Vanderpool writes the SHERO Newsletter and is an attorney, published author, contributor to newspapers and magazines and analyst for BBC radio. She can be reached at avanderpool@gmail.com or follow her on Twitter @girlsreallyrule.
Paid subscriptions allow me to keep publishing critical and informative work that is sometimes made available to the public — thank you. If you like this piece and you want to further support independent journalism, you can forward this article to others, get a paid subscription if you don’t already have one or send a gift subscription to someone else today.