Q&A of the Day – Will House Rules Changes Make the Government Better?
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Today’s Entry: Hey Brian, Q&A topic for you. We keep hearing that the GOP holdouts to McCarthy’s bid obtained concessions and that the government will work better. I heard that it’d be easier to dump McCarthy if they want to but what really changed? Is government really going to be more responsive? Thanks!
Bottom Line: I detect a bit of skepticism in the whole government now being better thing. Do you mean to tell me you’re not convinced good ‘ole Uncle Sam is looking out for you? So yes, a little skepticism is probably warranted. That said last night the House approved the newly agreed to rules which 20 Republican holdouts to McCarthy’s bid fought to gain concessions on. So, what changed? What does it mean to you? Will this help really Make Congress Great Again...or something like that? Like most congressional activity it’s complicated and the rules are long. But they are transparent.
The full rules package totaled 55 pages, and was immediately made available on the House website over the weekend. Now a lot of the stuff is parliamentarian mumbo jumbo that isn’t easily understood or of much consequence aside from the members who have to adhere to it. However, there are a bunch of changes this time around for two primary reasons. Control flipping from one party to the next and the demands of the Republican holdouts. Prior to the rules battle on the right, McCarthy had already proposed several changes, including two very visible ones. The end the Pelosi practice of remote voting and ditto with remote committee hearing participation. It could be argued those two alone will create a more accountable government where representatives will have to at least show up to work to do their job and won’t be distracted by running Zoom campaign events while waiting to vote. But then there’s the crux of the McCarthy concessions.
There were six specific rules changes that have the potential to have a meaningful impact on the way things get done, or don’t, in the House of Representatives for the next two years. A couple of these have been regularly discussed publicly over the past week during the debate and a few of them haven’t. We’ll start with the one that’s probably received the most attention. The motion to vacate.
- Motion to vacate: Any one Republican Conference member may call for a vote at any time to remove the House Speaker
- No omnibus legislation: Spending bills pertaining to different government departments won’t be able to be bundled together
- Capped federal spending: Spending for government programs will be capped at levels from the 2020-2021 fiscal year
- Mandatory review period for proposed legislation: Representatives will be provided a minimum of 72 hours to review proposed legislation prior to a vote being called
- Allowance for amendments: Representatives will have the opportunity to introduce amendments to proposed legislation which will receive up or down votes
- New investigative committee: A new subcommittee will be created to investigate the FBI and Department of Justice
So yeah, in context, these rule changes are a pretty big deal and if you believe in a more accountable and limited government, they’re meaningful as well. For example, the last official act of the previous Congress, to pass the $1.7 trillion Omnibus spending bill, quite literally isn’t possible in this conference. The Republicans in Congress which voted for the Omnibus stated they supported the defense spending in the legislation and were worried about the national safety implications of not adequately funding the Defense Department – thus voting for a bunch of stuff they didn’t support. Under these rules every department’s spending bills must be proposed and voted on independently. That’s a meaningful change that theoretically will lead to far fewer pork packages making their way through Congress. Speaking of which, capping federal government spending at levels from two years ago is a big development as well which will likely lead to outright cuts in some government programs after September. Also, the mandatory time to review legislation is a huge change as well. It’s been common for many Congresses, regardless of which party was in control of the House, for party leaders to debate and create the details of proposed legislation quickly calling for votes before those outside of leadership had an opportunity to review them. It will make the House a far more deliberative body than it's been and related...the amendment change is a big one too. House Speakers have long decided what will or won’t come up to a vote. That includes amendments to proposed legislation. The rule change allowing for votes on amendments, independent of the Speakers’ preference, is one of the bigger shifts in power that’ll take place. And then yes, there will be a subcommittee under the Judiciary Committee which will investigate the actions of the FBI and Department of Justice pertaining to their conduct going back to the origins, of the Trump-Russia collusion hoax, influencing of social media companies to ban content pertaining to the Hunter Biden laptop scandal, etc. But wait there’s more...
There were a couple of other agreements reached between McCarthy and the dissenters that will be of specific interest to them. McCarthy agreed to not use any PAC money to support primary challenges to any of the holdouts and the House Freedom Caucus was promised a third of the seats on the House Rules Committee – the Committee with the greatest reach in influence in the House. So yes, there was a lot which changed as a result of these rules changes and if you believe in limited government, they’re generally changes which should serve to make the government more accountable. Maybe all of the drama in the getting there wasn’t necessary. But it wasn’t all for not either.