Another Defeat for MAGA Extremists in the House -- Tallying the W's and L's

* * * PLUS: UKRAINE AID UPDATE * * *

Feathers of Hope is a network of ordinary citizens who have joined together around a shared commitment to diminishing the power and influence of MAGA extremists in the House of Representatives.

Since January 2023, we have been urging moderate Republicans and Democrats to form a bipartisan majority voting bloc in order to conduct our nation’s legislative business, and to defend the institution from its internal enemies.

Note: This site can also be accessed by entering FeathersOfHope.net in your browser window.

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Ukraine Aid Update

* * * Please scroll to the bottom of this post to find contact information for Republican representatives who support Aid to Ukraine. Call one, several or all of them today. Urge them to sign the discharge petition for the Senate-passed bill (HR 815), so it can be brought to the floor of the House for a vote. * * *

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Hours before its spring recess, the House finally passed appropriation bills for FY 2024.

For MAGA, that’s another Loss.

“They (Republican leadership) just surrendered.” — Ralph Norman (R-SC)

Since the first days of the 118th Congress in January, 2023, MAGA extremists have been pursuing an agenda of obstruction and disruption in the House of Representatives. Refusing to vote with majority Republicans to elect Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) Speaker, they extracted concession after concession from him until they couldn’t think of anything else to demand. So when they finally gave him their votes they felt truly empowered.

Keep in mind that MAGA extremists are not just a typical minority voting bloc like libertarians, or even the Tea Party.  The MAGA faction supports and identifies with January 6 conspirators, and speaks openly and proudly of a coming civil war.  Their intention has been to continue the assault on the heart of our democracy from within the House of Representatives itself.

It has been the focus of this network, Feathers of Hope, to defend the institution of the People’s House against MAGA’s ongoing attacks by raising our voices in opposition. While we’re accustomed to seeing breathless media coverage of every fresh norm violation by the extremists, there’s been little retrospective accounting of their success or failure.

So let’s tally up MAGA’s Wins and Losses in the House

As the spring recess enters its second week, this is a good time to evaluate the minority MAGA faction’s record over the last 14 months. Recognizing that we’ve played an active role in countering their efforts, we should be taking a victory lap:

118th Congress, First Session

1. In exchange for their votes, Kevin McCarthy made many promises to MAGA radicals. Among them were some major committee appointments, and a brand new committee for Jim Jordan (R-OH) to chair, investigating the “Weaponization of the Federal Government”. And for a few months they were able to pretend to power in the chamber.

   WIN

2. But when the full faith and credit of the United States was at risk in the June debt ceiling “crisis”, Speaker McCarthy betrayed them. He reached a comprehensive spending agreement with President Biden to raise the debt limit.

   LOSS

3. The Speaker then shepherded the Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA) to passage in the House, setting parameters of federal spending for Fiscal Year 2024. The “Aye”vote total included 149 Republicans and 165 Democrats.

   LOSS

4. Unsurprisingly, MAGA rebelled and blocked any further action on the floor by refusing to pass bills through the Rules Committee.

   WIN

5. Since implementation of the FRA requires passing appropriation bills, Speaker McCarthy quickly caved and agreed to introduce bills with spending limits far below those specified in the FRA — even though those bills stood no chance of being passed by the Senate or signed by the President.

   WIN

6. Mr. McCarthy had now completely lost control of his conference. The result was a rush to the floor of competing nonsensical resolutions, their sponsors crashing into each other as they sought media attention, and the cash flow generated by it.

   Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Lauren Boebert (R-CO) had a public spat and an exchange of name-calling over whose Biden Impeachment bill should take priority.

   LOSS

   1. That was followed quickly by a move to expunge the Trump impeachments by Greene and Elise Stafanik (R-NY), even though there’s no such thing as deleting something that actually happened.

      LOSS

   2. Meanwhile, the far-right Freedom Caucus, still bitter about being momentarily betrayed by Speaker McCarthy during the debt limit “crisis”, was considering the expulsion of some members for voting with him in favor of the FRA. That would include Ms. Greene and possibly even Jim Jordan who’s a founding member of the group. (Notably, the then little-known representative from Louisiana’s 4th district, Mike Johnson voted for the FRA.)

      LOSS

7. As the summer recess ended and appropriation bills still had not become law, a shutdown of government services was imminent. To avoid that eventuality, Mr. McCarthy introduced and passed a series of Continuing Resolutions (CR’s) to keep the government funded — all vehemently opposed by MAGA.

   LOSS

8. This was the last straw for the MAGA extremist faction, so they pulled the trigger on their biggest weapon: They introduced and passed a motion to “Vacate the Chair”, removing Kevin McCarthy from the Speakership on October 3.

   WIN

9. But the MAGA faction over-played their hand. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) had moved to vacate the chair, but he did not expect it would pass. When it did, he and his allies had no strategy in place.

   LOSS

10. While they were able to block any of McCarthy’s top leadership team from ascending to the Speakership, they were unable to elect their preferred candidate, Jim Jordan. In multiple ballots, his vote total steadily decreased even as Fox News publicly called for their audience to lobby Republican members to support him.

    LOSS

11. After three weeks of increasingly bitter in-fighting among Republicans, Mike Johnson (R-LA) was named Speaker by unanimous GOP vote. Mr. Johnson is a January 6 collaborator who filed a brief with the Supreme Court challenging Pennsylvania’s certified electors. He was promptly nick-named “MAGA Mike” by Democrats.

    On the surface, this seemed like a WIN at the time. BUT . . .

    1. The sudden and surprising turn of events raised questions almost immediately. Why had the moderates joined forces with extremists after standing firmly against them for weeks?

    2. There were actually two votes taken on this nomination: one behind closed doors in the evening, with 22 Members not in attendance; the other (unanimous) vote was taken on the following morning. What happened overnight to convince the hold-outs?

    3. Well-sourced reporting revealed that Mr. Johnson had made certain promises to the moderates. Unlike the verbal and public concessions extracted by MAGA from Kevin McCarthy, these were written and kept secret. But the crucial difference is that the new Speaker’s promises left him indebted to moderates, not to MAGA extremists.

    4. Now, with the advantage of hindsight, that reporting seems to be accurate.

       Let’s call this a TIE.

12. Mike Johnson finally was sworn-in as Speaker on October 25. But with Mr. McCarthy’s CR about to expire in a few weeks, there wasn’t time to avoid a government shutdown without another set of CR’s. These were angrily opposed by the MAGA faction who wanted a shutdown and thought they now had an ally in the Speaker’s seat. The new CR’s were passed in mid-November on a 336 - 95 vote, with near-unanimous support from Democrats.

    LOSS

13. All the while, serious legislators in Senate committees were busily crafting 12 appropriation bills to authorize government funding in accordance with spending parameters set by the FRA. The first, and arguably most urgent, of these to be passed by the Senate (87-13), and forwarded to the House, was the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). Again the MAGA faction was demanding that the House version of the NDAA include various restrictions on Defense Dept. spending which they characterized as “woke” — restrictions that would have guaranteed more delays.

    But to the surprise of most observers, with only two days left before the scheduled December holiday recess, Mr. Johnson orchestrated a suspension of the Rules to bring the NDAA as written by the Senate to the floor for a vote. The bill passed by a vote of 310-118.

    LOSS

    1. While the NDAA did pass, it reduced funding for the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative from $800 million last year to $300 million currently. This reduction didn’t receive much attention at the time because a separate aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan was in the works and was expected to pass soon. That package became the National Security Supplemental Appropriations Act (HR 815), which passed the Senate on February 13, but has still not received a vote in the House. (See below.)

       WIN

As the first session of the 118th Congress came to an end, a clear pattern had emerged: an unspoken bipartisan alliance of moderate Republicans and Democrats has formed, one committed to responsible governance.

118th Congress, Second Session

1. Over the holiday break, negotiators for both parties in both chambers of Congress worked to reach agreement on the remaining appropriation bills. On January 7, Democratic and Republican leaders of the House and Senate announced agreement on spending limits for appropriation bills to fund the government through Fiscal Year 2024. As expected, all are within approximately the same parameters as the original debt ceiling agreement which produced the Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA).

   And once again, The agreement was quickly condemned by the far-right, with the Freedom Caucus being most succinct: “It’s even worse than we thought. Don’t believe the spin… This is total failure.”

   LOSS

2. Due to the time-consuming legislative process necessary for passage of these complex bills, another pair of CR’s was needed to keep the government funded in the meantime. The first extended the deadlines to March 1 and 8; the second to March 8 and 22. All were passed over the objections of MAGA radicals, as were the final bills themselves.

   LOSS, LOSS, LOSS

3. Ever the publicity hound, Marjorie Greene promptly filed a new motion to vacate the chair, targeting Speaker Johnson. Though the impetus for this is the passing of appropriation bills in accordance with the FRA, Ms. Greene has explicitly linked activating the motion to any potential funding of assistance to Ukraine.

   This is an empty gesture, as she knows there’s no appetite for another round of intra-party feuding over the Speakership. Furthermore, Democrats have indicated that they would not join the effort to vacate if it’s over the Speaker’s support for Ukraine aid. So the move is a thoroughly pointless embarrassment.

   LOSS

4. And of course, no summary of MAGA failures would be complete without considering the effort to impeach President Biden. Former Speaker McCarthy had initiated an impeachment inquiry on September 12 as part of his effort to appease the extremists then threatening to remove him from the Speaker’s chair.

   As was acknowledged at the time even by many Republicans, there was scant evidence of any high crimes or misdemeanors. The hearings and sworn testimony has confirmed this. And now the accusations have been exposed as part of a Russian intelligence operation. resulting in the arrest last month of the main accuser, Alexander Smirnov.

   Last week, the chairman of the inquiry announced there would be no formal impeachment vote. It’s over.

   LOSS.

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   Score:

   WINS 5, LOSSES 16, TIE 1

With all the hand-wringing about the rise of right-wing extremism, and the all too genuine threat of fascist leanings by MAGA radical extremists, it’s useful to take a closer look at their very real and demonstrated limitations.

The House of Representatives is where those who support convicted January 6 insurrectionists currently wield the most political power.  But after all the drama, a minority faction of extremists in the House remains just that: a minority faction.

Of course, those who want to “burn it all down” don’t need majority support, nor do they need to score more Wins than Losses. Their threat remains. We need to stay vigilant, and deliver Democratic victories in the House, Senate and White House this fall to truly safeguard our republic.

But it’s also true that the MAGA radicals have over-estimated the extent of their appeal. And in the process, they’ve alienated traditional Republicans — moderates who would ordinarily value party unity over most other considerations. This casual disregard for the interests of their Republicans colleagues, those who value the institutions of our democratic republic, shows no sign of subsiding. And that pretty much guarantees they’ll continue to be a minority.

In the end, MAGA extremists were able to disrupt House proceedings for a time. But ultimately, they are left with only exaggerated performative outrage — the unmistakeable signature of sore losers.

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Mike Gallagher (R-WI) resigns effective April 19.

Resignation shrinks GOP majority, but Dems’ temporary gain is a loss for the House.

Long-time readers of Feathers of Hope may recall that Representative Mike Gallagher was one of four traditional Republicans whom I had suggested would be a good choice to replace Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) as Speaker of the House.

Mr. Gallagher is the rare Representative who has used his own experience to seriously study why our Congress is so dysfunctional. After his first term in the House, he wrote an essay in 2018 for the Atlantic magazine titled "How to Salvage Congress", which could still serve as a guide for reforming the institution once Democrats have re-gained the majority. (For a more detailed summary of the Atlantic essay, please see my July 14, 2023, post: Why Is Congress So Messed Up?, or read the original piece linked above.)

One of the most erudite members of Congress, holding a PhD and 2 Masters Degrees, Mike Gallagher served 7 years active duty as a Marine intelligence officer, where he learned to speak Arabic and served on General David Petraus’ Middle East Assessment Team. Before being elected to represent the Republican-leaning Green Bay area of Wisconsin, he was a Republican aide for Middle East, North Africa and Counter-terrorism on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Most notably, Mr. Gallagher was responsible for establishing the well-respected bipartisan “Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party” of which he is currently Chair.

Making his resignation effective April 19, means that there will be no replacement for him before the November election. That reduces the Republican House majority to just 4, meaning if only 2 defect on any vote they have no majority. It’s an interesting choice since an earlier effective date would have not resulted in a vacancy. He also chose to vote against the impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas last month, joining far-right Ken Buck (R-CO) who resigned ten days ago. (Mr. Buck also signed the Democrats’ discharge petition for HR 815, the Ukraine aid package, on his way out the door.)

It’s not clear why Rep. Gallagher is resigning, but the crumbling of his party around him is undoubtedly a factor. He is said to have remarked that Congress is no place to grow old in — a remarkable shift from the hopeful tone of his 2018 essay.

Let’s not misunderstand. Mike Gallagher is a conservative Republican, and in the House he generally votes with his party. But he is a serious legislator, comfortable working with Democrats to address our country’s challenges. His successor representing the usually reliable Republican 8th district is likely to be more closely aligned with MAGA extremists. So unless Democrats can pull off an upset, we’ll have to count this resignation as a W for them.

Note: An upset is not an unrealistic expectation. The 8th district includes Wisconsin’s third and sixth most populous cities: Green Bay and Appleton. Both voted 51% - 48% for progressive Janet Protasiewicz for Supreme Court last year. Also, the district went for Obama by 54% in 2008.

Democrats didn’t even field a candidate in the 8th district last cycle. This year Kristin Lyerly, an OB-GYN pro-choice activist, is likely to make the run. With access to abortion enjoying majority support even among Republicans, Dr. Lyerly could possibly flip the seat. She has not yet formally announced her candidacy. You can encourage her here: kristinforwisconsin@gmail.com .

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Last week, Adrienne Watson, the spokesperson for the National Security Council, called again for Speaker Johnson to bring up the bipartisan national security bill providing aid to Ukraine that the Senate passed in February. She warned: “Ukraine’s need is urgent, and we cannot afford any further delays.”

A bipartisan majority of Our Representatives (both Dem & GOP) want to sustain aid to Ukraine. The National Security Supplemental Appropriations Act (HR 815), commonly known as the Ukraine/Israel/Taiwan aid package, passed in the Senate by a 70 - 29 vote weeks ago.

Speaker Mike Johnson has not brought it to the floor of the House, so Democrats are circulating a discharge petition to force it out of committee and be voted on. The petition needs 218 signatures. It currently has 191-- only one Republican. Everyone reading this can help by calling Republican Representatives and urging them to sign the discharge petition for HR 815, to expedite delivery of military assistance for Ukraine before it's too late

Once the bill passes the House it would go directly to the President for his signature and immediately become law.

There is also another discharge petition being circulated in support of the “Defending Borders, Defending Democracies Act” (HR 7372), introduced by Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA).

This stripped-down version of HR 815 substantially reduces the total amount of aid in the package; in Ukraine’s case from $60 billion to $48 billion. Limited to defense-only military aid, the bill also contains none of the $9.2 billion in humanitarian assistance for civilians in Gaza, the West Bank, and Ukraine included in HR 815.

Over this past weekend, Speaker Johnson announced he would be bringing some version of aid for Ukraine to the floor next week (April 9-12):

“After praying on it, I’ve decided to bring the Ukraine aid package to the floor of the House as soon as we reconvene in a week. Moses stepped up to confront tyranny in his day, and I’m going to follow his example. We can’t sit on our hands and just offer thoughts and prayers as brave men and women fight for freedom.”

In his typically cryptic style, he did not actually specify whether he’d be supporting HR 815, or Rep. Fitzpatrick’s bill, or some entirely new measure separating Ukraine’s military assistance from other parts of the package.

Because of the complications and delays inherent to starting again from scratch, it’s important to insist that the Senate-passed HR 815 be brought to the floor for a vote. The easiest way for that to happen is through the Discharge Petition, because it only needs a simple majority vote of 50% + 1. The other route, Suspension of the Rules, requires a two-thirds majority vote. All Mr. Johnson needs to do is call for Republican members to sign the petition.

It’s important to specify support for the Senate-passed HR 815 discharge petition.

• By calling the Representatives listed below, urging that they sign the discharge petition for HR 815 now, we are giving voice to what an overwhelming majority of Americans support: immediate delivery of military assistance to Ukrainians courageously resisting Russia’s brutal attacks.

• Simultaneously, we are defending the House of Representatives itself — confronting the obstruction of MAGA extremists and their attempt to disrupt the workings of our democratic republic.

Please call these Representatives today. Urge them to sign the discharge petition for the Senate-passed HR 815, The National Security Supplemental Appropriations Act.

To connect with any Representative, you can call the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121.

Also, please call the office of Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA): (202) 225-4000. Remind him that Ukraine is fast running out of resources and needs our assistance immediately. Bring the Ukraine/Israel/Taiwan aid bill, HR 815, to the floor now by asking Republicans to sign the petition.

The following Republican representatives are known to support aid to Ukraine. Urge them to join with Democrats to sign the discharge petition for HR 815 now, and then to vote for the bill.

1. Don Bacon (R-NE): (202) 225-4155 D.C. or (402) 938-0300 District

2. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA): (202) 225-4276 D.C. or (215) 579-8102 District

3. Mike Gallagher (R-WI): (202) 225-5665 D.C. or (920) 301-4500 District

4. David Joyce (R- OH): (202) 225-5731 D.C. or (440) 352-3939 District

5. John Curtis (R-UT): (202) 225-7751 D.C. or (801) 922-5400 District

6. Ashley Hinson (R-IA): (202) 225-2911 D.C. or (319) 364-2288 District

7. Andrew Garbarino (R-NY) : (202) 225-7896 D.C. or (631) 541-4225 District

8. Dan Newhouse (R-WA): (202) 225-5816 D.C. or (509) 452-3243 District

(The following members represent districts carried by President Biden in 2020)

• David Schweikert (R-AZ): (202) 225-2190 D.C. or (480) 946-2411 District

• Juan Ciscomani (R-AZ): (202) 225-2542 D.C. or (520) 459-3115 District

• John Duarte (R-CA): (202) 225-1947 D.C. or (209)-226-6880 District

• David Valadao (R-CA): (202) 225-4695 D.C. or (661) 864-7736 District

• Mike Garcia (R-CA): (202) 225-1956 D.C. or (661) 839-0532 District

• Young Kim (R-CA): (202) 225-4111 D.C. or (714) 984-2440 District

• Michelle Steel (R-CA): (202) 225-2415 D.C. or (714) 960-6483 District

• Tom Kean (R-NJ): (202) 225-5361 D.C. or (908) 547-3307 District

• Nick LaLota (R-NY): (202) 225-3826 D.C. or (631) 289-1097 District

• Anhony D’Esposito (R-NY): (202) 225-5516 D.C. or (516) 739-3008 District

• Mike Lawler (R-NY): (202) 225-6506 D.C. or 845 743-7130 District

• Marc Molinaro (R-NY): (202) 225-5441 D.C. or (607) 242-0200 District

• Brandon Williams (R-NY): (202) 225-3701 D.C. or (315) 233-4333 District

• Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-OR): (202) 225-5711 D.C. or (541) 604-3141 District

• Jen Kiggans (R-VA): (202) 225-4215 D.C. or (757) 364-7650 District

This is a network of ordinary citizens. In a democracy, we exercise our power by raising our voices. To be silent is to be powerless.