This problem has been pervasive for some time.
It’s now underground. It lurks beneath the surface. It is not always perceptible.
Except for those who watch Congress closely.
But the issue has come to the fore since the House stumbled badly in its attempt to avert a government shutdown last week.
Dozens of House members rally over funding for Afghanistan visa program as President Trump vows deep spending cuts
February 13, 2024 at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, DC. (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
In other words:
Congress wavered between a staggering 1,500-page spending bill. Then, a narrow 116-page bill supported by President-elect Trump was defeated. The situation worsened when the House received only 174 votes for the Trump-backed bill, with 38 Republicans voting against it. The situation became even more dire when the House actually voted to avoid a holiday government shutdown, but it passed the bill with a majority of Democrats (196) than Republicans (170). Thirty-four Republicans voted against it.
It has long been expected that House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) may face difficulty in taking the speaker’s gavel as soon as the new Congress convenes at noon ET on January 3rd. was. Parliamentary experts knew that a breakdown in the contours of parliament could put Mr Johnson in trouble. Weeks after the November election, the reed-thin House majority was in the spotlight. This could turn into a full-blown crisis for Johnson and House Republicans when the speaker vote begins next Friday after 1pm ET.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson emerged last week feeling hurt over the government’s funding of Mr Donnybrook. Between four and 10 Republicans could oppose Johnson for speaker.
Donald Trump says Mike Johnson will ‘easily remain chairman’ if he acts ‘firmly and decisively’ on spending bill
It has long been thought that Mike Johnson might have a hard time getting the speaker’s gavel when the new parliament convenes on January 3rd. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc, via Getty Images)
The calculation is as follows:
The House of Representatives has 434 members, with one vacancy. That’s thanks to former Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz. He resigned from his post for this Congress several weeks ago. Gaetz won re-election in November, but his resignation letter read on the House floor indicated he did not intend to serve in the new Congress, which begins in January.
This is the breakdown at the start of Congress: 219 Republicans and 215 Democrats.
Rep. Michael Walz (R-Florida), whom President Trump nominated to be national security adviser, remains in the House for now. So does Representative Elise Stefanik (RN.Y.). President Trump selected her as ambassador to the United Nations. It awaits Senate approval, likely in late January or early February. If Walz and Stefanik resign, the Republican majority will shrink to 217-214.
But the Jan. 3 presidential election poses special challenges. Here’s the hurdle for Johnson, or anyone else. The Speaker of the House must have an absolute majority of all members voting by name. That is, the person with the most votes does not win. Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has chosen House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D.N.Y.) as the speaker as usual when the current Congress begins in January 2023. This happened repeatedly when I won the competition. Appropriate threshold.
Speaker of the House of Commons Mike Johnson appears, still hurting over the government’s recent donnybrook funding. (Getty)
More details later.
So let’s solve Mike Johnson’s calculations. If four of the 219 Republicans voted for someone else, and all Democrats voted for Jeffries, the vote would be 215 to 214. But there’s no speaker. No one reached a full majority of all members who voted by name. If all 434 members vote, the magic number will be 218.
By rules, this paralyzes the House. The House absolutely, unequivocally, cannot do anything until it elects a Speaker. period.
The House of Representatives cannot swear in members. Technically, they’re still members of the House of Representatives. Only after the House elects the Speaker will the Speaker be sworn in as a member.
It is true that the House cannot pass the bill. Committees cannot be established. Parliament will be paralyzed and frozen until a speaker is elected.
So I hope you’ll sit down for the next part.
It also means that the House of Representatives will not be able to certify the Electoral College results and Trump will be sworn in as the 47th president of the United States on January 6.
The House absolutely, unequivocally, cannot do anything until it elects a Speaker. period. (Valerie Preche/Photo in association with Getty Images)
Failure to elect a Speaker forces the House to vote multiple times…
And then… and… even more…
Until I finally tapped someone.
In McCarthy’s election two years ago, 15 ballots were burned in five days.
After lawmakers ousted McCarthy in October 2023, the House of Representatives was placed in a three-week cryogenic freeze. In Congress, two speaker candidates, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., and House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, R-Minn., were knocked off the floor. . – And there is one candidate on the floor: Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio).
So you can see the problem.
Consider for a moment that until last year, the House had never held a second vote to choose a speaker since Speaker Frederick Gillette (R-Mass.) in 1923.
In 1849, it took 63 votes for the House to finally settle on Democratic Georgia Speaker Howell Cobb.
But that’s nothing. The longest speaker election occurred in 1856, on the 133rd ballot, two months before the House elected Speaker Nathaniel Banks, Republican of Massachusetts.
Therefore, it would be dangerous to extend this situation into a conflict with January 6, the legal day for certifying election results and now one of the most ignominious dates in American history.
Johnson allies urge Trump to intervene as fast-paced speech battle threatens to delay 2024 certification
Without a speaker, the House cannot certify the Electoral College results and Trump will become the 47th president of the United States on January 6. (AP/J. Scott Applewhite)
To be clear, there is no dispute that Trump won the election. There is no expectation that there will be another riot at the Capitol like the one four years ago. But not certifying the Electoral College on the day it was supposed to be completed, especially after what we’ve experienced in 2021, is playing with fire. Such a scenario would once again reveal other previously unsuspected vulnerabilities in America’s fragile political system.
On January 6, the House and Senate are scheduled to meet in a joint session of Congress to tally and certify the electoral votes. Any dispute over a state’s electoral rolls would force the House and Senate to debate and vote on the results separately. The election will not be finalized until the joint session concludes and the vice president, in this case Kamala Harris, announces the winner in her capacity as president of the Senate.
Congress doesn’t have to certify the Electoral College on the calendar day of January 6, but there is actually some wiggle room to wrap things up. In 2021, the Electoral College was not certified until January 7th at approximately 3:52 a.m. This will only become a big problem if it lingers until noon on January 20th. That’s when the Constitution provides for the right to vote for the next president. oath of office.
What happens if the Electoral College is not sorted by January 20th? Well, the Biden presidency is over. So he was gone. The same goes for Harris. Next in line of succession to the president is the Speaker of the House of Representatives. Well, there’s no speaker. So who will become president?
On January 6, the House and Senate are scheduled to meet in a joint session of Congress to tally and certify the electoral votes. (Getty Images)
Now, at that moment, we have the president pro tempore of the Senate, who is the most senior member of the majority party. He or she is fourth in the presidential rankings. Currently, the interim president is Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash. But Republicans claimed control of the chamber in early January. And unlike the House, the Senate can function despite obstruction over the speaker. This means that 91-year-old Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) will become president pro tempore of the Senate. Mr. Grassley has served in the Senate since 1981.
If the House is still wasting its time and trying to elect a speaker on January 20th, Grassley will likely become the “acting president.”
I say “probably” because this involves important extra-constitutional territory. These are unprecedented scenarios. A strange land never visited in America’s political experience.
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And it all depends on whether Mike Johnson, or frankly anyone else, closes out the Speaker vote with the Jan. 3 dispatch. Interregnums like the last two presidential elections begin to establish difficult historical precedents.
But frankly, it’s unclear whether the House can avoid such a blowback.
It’s about mathematics. And then again, keeping Congress balanced is difficult at best.
Chad Pergram currently serves as a senior Congressional correspondent for FOX News Channel (FNC). He joined the network in September 2007 and is based in Washington, DC.
