Tough negotiations in Congress that on Saturday ended with Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) taking the gavel as House speaker have led to a series of compromises, including seven conservative bills that are guaranteed to be put to a vote.
McCarthy had to make numerous concessions to win over a holdout group of populist Republicans, including one that gives him a fragile grip on power by allowing just one member to move to vacate the speaker’s chair.
The rocky road to the gavel—which saw 14 failed votes before the 15th finally saw McCarthy ascend to the House top job—led to a compromise on a rules package, which includes seven bills that the 20 holdout Republicans pushed for.
The House rules package is expected to be put to a vote on Jan. 9.
“This is what we’ve been fighting for,” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), one of the Republicans who opposed McCarthy’s bid for the speakership and pushed for concessions, said in a Sunday post on Twitter.
This is what we’ve been fighting for https://t.co/7ZSvILkqCM
— Matt Gaetz (@mattgaetz) January 8, 2023
The rules package includes the following seven bills that are guaranteed to come up for a vote in the House under a subsection of the package that calls for separate consideration of the bills under a closed rule with one hour of debate.
1) A bill to cut some of the additional funding that was made available to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
2) A bill to authorize the secretary of Homeland Security to turn away people crossing the border illegally.
3) A bill that includes prohibiting the secretary of energy from sending petroleum products from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to China.
4) A tough-on-crime bill that includes amending the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act to direct the district attorney and prosecutor’s office to report to the attorney general.
5) A bill to require a national instant crime background check system to notify U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other law enforcement agencies when information surfaces that a person present in the United States illegally may be trying to obtain a firearm.
6) A bill to prohibit taxpayer funded abortions.
By Tom Ozimek
