Senate page     Jan. 06


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New polls:  
Dem pickups: PA
GOP pickups: (None)

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Lucky Number Seven (or Eleven) for Kevin?

Nope. It's déjà vu all over again. The House held another five votes for speaker yesterday, and got no closer to choosing someone for the job.

Here are the votes in each round:

	Day 1			Day 2			Day 3
Candidate	R 1	R 2	R 3	R 4	R 5	R 6	R 7	R 8	R 9	R 10	R 11
Hakeem Jeffries	212	212	212	212	212	212	212	212	212	212	212
Kevin McCarthy	203	203	202	201	201	201	201	201	200	200	200
Byron Donalds	1	0	0	20	20	20	19	17	17	13	12
Kevin Hern	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	2	3	7	7
Donald Trump	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	1	0	0	1
Jim Jordan	6	19	20	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Andy Biggs	10	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Jim Banks	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Lee Zeldin	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Present	0	0	0	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1

The changes that took place on Wednesday are akin to rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Some of the Republican members who had been voting for Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) shifted their support to Rep. Kevin Hern (R-OK). Halfway through the day, Rep. Ken Buck (R-CO) left for a medical appointment, which is why House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) dropped down to 200 votes (though Buck has warned repeatedly that he only promised to vote for McCarthy for five rounds, so he could possibly jump ship at any time). In three of yesterday's five rounds, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) voted for Donald Trump. Presumably this was meant to please the Dear Leader, but we'd say it actually was more of an embarrassment. First, because nobody else voted for Trump. Second, because there is normally a big round of applause when a candidate's vote totals are announced by the clerk of the house. When the votes for "the honorable Donald John Trump" were announced, however, there was only anemic applause, at best.

And speaking of Trump, we know that his ability to influence the speaker election is roughly equal to his ability to let an insult roll off his back without firing back. So, he isn't going to be the wild card here. But how about the right-wing media? After all, Republican politicians tend to bow before Fox, et al., as well. In this case, however, the right-wing media is just as divided as the House Republican Conference is. Most obviously, Sean Hannity is pushing for Republicans to unite behind McCarthy, while Tucker Carlson is egging on those Republicans who want to burn it all down. So, the right-wing media isn't going to be the wild card here, either.

And speaking of burning it all down, the 2-year anniversary of the 1/6 insurrection arrives today. And, whaddya know? The House members who cheered the insurrectionists (and may possibly have been aided and abetted them) are the same people who are throwing a wrench in the works right now. In other words, they are once again waging war against the government. The difference this time is that it's from within. And we are hardly the only ones to make this observation. For example, in a piece for Slate headlined "Another January, Another Attempt at Destabilizing the Government," Dahlia Lithwick writes:

Except, of course, the events of Jan. 6, 2021 and Jan. 3-? of 2023 are not at all unrelated. Nor are they sequential points along a continuum that is leading us to a better place. Instead, they represent the locomotive and the caboose of the same train: Each is a point along a terrifying line of governmental failure; each is a subversion of the principles of lawful transition of power. But certainly they are moving in the same direction, and there should be no joy found in watching the present and past pancaking back on itself. In many ways, the events of this week should be as frightening to us as the events of two years past, if not more so. This, too, is an insurrection. That it's coming—quite literally—from inside the House in 2023 should no more be grounds for popcorn and selfies from Democrats than the Capitol insurrection was in 2021. This is a profoundly serious systems failure, Trumpism without the relative coherence of Trump, and a triumph of nihilist anti-government fan fiction. And this go-round, those forces have a vote that is big enough to gum up the entire operation.

Or how about this from The Philadelphia Inquirer's J. Scott Applewhite, headlined "On 2nd anniversary of Jan. 6, Trump's disciples succeed in shutting down the Capitol":

One of the ironies in this remarkable week—and there have been so many—is that McCarthy has proved to be both an enabler of Jan. 6 and its ongoing zeitgeist, yet also its victim. If the spineless Californian had followed his basic instincts in the hours following the insurrection—when he blamed the violence on POTUS 45 and claimed to colleagues he would ask Trump to resign, stating "I've had it with this guy"—he might have become a leader. Instead, McCarthy flew to Mar-a-Lago just weeks later to lick the boots of the failed coup leader and then empowered the most extreme members of his caucus. Instead of cutting out the cancer that was revealed two years ago this week, he allowed it to metastasize and strangle the chamber he wished so pathetically to lead.

Assuming that these MAGA members are not indicted, then the only people with power to rein them in are the voters that sent them to Washington and/or the other Republican officeholders. The voters, of course, are quite happy with the Matt Gaetzes and Paul Gosars of the world. And as to the other Republican officeholders, polarization is so ingrained at the moment that they are unwilling or unable to consider the alternative to the MAGA 20, which would be working with the moderate Democrats to get past this mess and, maybe, to get some stuff done.

McCarthy, for his part, continues to demonstrate that the only strategy he'll consider here is "accommodate the insurgents." Reportedly, he has agreed to drop the number of members needed for a motion to vacate down to one, and also to increase the hard-right's membership on the House Rules Committee, which would make it easier for them to kill legislation they don't like. This is about as complete a surrender as he is capable of proffering.

And yet, giving the MAGA militia the two biggest things they want does not appear likely to solve the logjam. First, it's not clear whether these boons were offered on Wednesday night or Thursday night; different sources give different timelines. However, if it was Wednesday night, then the scheme has already failed. Second, a majority of the Republicans in the House would have to agree to the motion-to-vacate rule change, and it's not clear that can happen. There would be enormous risk of this same exact fiasco happening again, and possibly at a critical juncture.

As a way of putting it all together, we thought we'd do a rundown of the people most likely to be the next speaker of the house, in our view, from most to least likely:

1. Kevin McCarthy: McCarthy is still the most likely speaker, because he represents the "stick with the status quo" approach, and he's the only person who does. For every other approach ("pick a McCarthy ally," "pick a moderate who can gain Democratic support," etc.), there are multiple potential options. So, it's not quite plausible for any one of them to overcome him, quite yet.
   
   That said, we think the Californian is now a bit less than 50% to become speaker. Maybe 40%? The first problem is that history is against him. In all of U.S. history, you know how many times a member has finished second in the first round of voting, and then gone on to be elected Speaker? Once. And that was well over 200 years ago (Frederick Muhlenberg in 1793).
   
   It's true, as everyone knows at this point, that disputed speaker elections have been a rarity since the Civil War. However, there have nonetheless been 14 of them over the years, and there are really only two dynamics that we see in them. The first is that the early frontrunner makes a few concessions, picks up a few votes, and goes on to victory. The second is that there's a "time for a change" sentiment, and none of the top vote-getters in the first round end up victorious. McCarthy is really falling victim to both dynamics. He can't make enough concessions to a crew that believes it is time for a change.
   
   More to the point, however, is this: McCarthy might be able to flip the votes of some of the holdouts. For example, Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) is apparently gettable. However, there are at least five Republican members—Bob Good (VA), Matt Rosendale (MT), Matt Gaetz (FL), Lauren Boebert (CO), Andy Biggs (AZ)—who say they are a hard "no," and that isn't changing. McCarthy's strategy is to buy off the insurgents who can be bought, and then rely on peer pressure to flip enough additional votes for him to reach the promised land. Both halves of that strategy seem dubious to us.
   
   
2. Steve Scalise: If it's not McCarthy, then Steve Scalise (FL) is allegedly the fallback option. He's a little more right-wing than McCarthy is, and he's not McCarthy, so giving him the speaker's gavel would be a double win for the MAGA maniacs.
   
   However, we wonder if Scalise is too close to McCarthy for the tastes of the MAGA 20, or is too right-wing (and, specifically, too racist) for the more moderate Republicans. If either of these things is true, then his goose is cooked.
   
   
3. Elise Stefanik: Although there isn't much talk about her, to us, Elise Stefanik (NY) is more plausible than Scalise if the new speaker is to be a non-McCarthy member of House leadership. She used to be a moderate, and so may have more cachet with the moderates than Scalise. And she's now pretty whackadoodle, and so many have plenty of cachet with the MAGA types. She's also been around for much less time than McCarthy/Scalise, which means less time to make enemies. Finally, the Republicans have been trying to make clear that they're not just a party for white men (they're also for white women!), and so have been trying to get some women members into high-profile roles in the Party. This would help on that front.
   
   
4. Fred Upton: Several times, we've written that a compromise option could be a "placeholder" Republican; someone who will do the job for now, but will not be a long-term obstacle to the ambitions of Republican House members. Our guess was that the most likely placeholder would be Dean of the House Hal Rogers (KY), but it would seem that former representative Fred Upton (MI) is the pick, should it come to that. This is the only plausible way that the House ends up with a speaker who is not a member, we'd say.
   
   
5. Don Bacon/Young Kim/Brian Fitzpatrick: Although Upton is moderate as compared to the far-right elements of the Republican Conference, he's not actually all that moderate. The Democrats might not be open to voting for someone as conservative as he is, or they might not be keen on the idea of a non-member running the show. Don Bacon (NE), Young Kim (CA) and Brian Fitzpatrick (PA) stand out to us as the current members most likely to lead a coalition House.
   
   
6. Byron Donalds/Kevin Hern: If the MAGA 20 had unified on an alternative candidate, and had voted for that person over and over, then that person might have gained some momentum, and might be worth taking seriously. But that is not what has happened; the MAGA 20 are all over the place. So we mention Donalds and Hern because their names are now in the conversation, but we just don't see a path for them.
   
   
7. Hakeem Jeffries: From here on out, it's "no freaking way" candidates whom we mention just for the sake of completeness. It is a strange quirk of the American system of governance that Jeffries has been the leader for all 11 rounds of balloting, and yet has no chance to win. It would take a bad B-movie plot, like the shrimp at the next meeting of the Republican conference is tainted, and so all of a sudden 50 Republican members are down with food poisoning and are unable to vote.
   
   
8. Adam Kinzinger/Justin Amash: Fred Upton is an outsider that Republicans would theoretically like and Democrats would theoretically tolerate. These two former members are the other side of the coin: Democrats would theoretically like them and Republicans would theoretically tolerate then. However, the folks who are talking about Adam Kinzinger (IL) and Justin Amash (MI) are overlooking one small thing: The current Republican members would not tolerate them. They are as toxic as it gets for the GOP base, outside of Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Liz Cheney (R-WY). Any Republican member who supported Kinzinger or Amash for speaker would almost certainly be ending their own career in Congress.
   
   
9. Jim Jordan: Just to reiterate what we've already written this week, Jordan is too much of a firebrand, and he has too much baggage (looking the other way while a molestation scandal unfolded under his nose). He may have gotten some Day 1 votes, but he's never going to be speaker.
   
   
10. Donald Trump: We have written many, many times that there is no way Republicans allow Trump to take over the House. They won't say it out loud, but most of them want him to go away.
    
    The one path, which we noted this week, was if the MAGA crew put Trump forward and the other members were just too frightened to oppose him. But yesterday's voting, in which the former president got just 1/20th of the MAGA vote and inspired zero enthusiasm, confirmed that even that narrow path is not actually there.

They are going to be back at it today at noon ET. If McCarthy can't get across the finish line today, then he goes from "deep trouble" to "Marianas Trench-deep trouble." (Z)

Stabenow Will Retire...

As readers of this site know, the 2024 election cycle is already underway. And for loyal party members who are up in 2024, that means that the time to decide on a reelection bid is upon us. If they are running, they need to get their campaign staff together and ramp up their fundraising. And if they are not running, they need to get out of the way so that potential contenders can do the same.

It's early January, and the House doesn't even have a speaker as yet. Nonetheless, the first domino has fallen. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) has decided that four terms is enough and that she doesn't want to be in the Senate into her eighties. And so, she announced yesterday that she would step aside in favor of "a new generation of leaders."

The bad news for Democrats is that the 2024 map was already brutal, and now they have to defend an open seat in a swingy state. That said, the state has sent a grand total of one Republican to the Senate in the last half-century (Spencer Abraham), so let's not overstate exactly how swingy the seat is. Further, the Democratic bench in Michigan is deep. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg have already opted out of the race, but Reps. Elissa Slotkin and Debbie Dingell are possibilities, as is state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, who went viral last year due to her floor speech lambasting anti-LGBTQ+ bigotry.

On the Republican side, the bench is more shallow. There are no Republicans in statewide office right now. Rep.-elect John James was the GOP candidate in each of the last two Senate elections in Michigan, and gave Stabenow all she could handle 6 years ago, so he will probably be back for a third bite at the apple. The name of Rep. Bill Huizenga, who will commence his seventh term in the House if they ever elect a speaker, is also being bandied about. And let's not forget that musicians Ted Nugent and Kid Rock are also from Michigan, as is actor Tim Allen. After all, in today's Republican Party, lack of experience at any level of government is a feature, not a bug. (Z)

...But Kennedy Won't

Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) flirted briefly with a run for the Louisiana governor's mansion. But yesterday, he announced that he wasn't running, and that he would stay in the Senate.

For some politicians, it is more attractive to be the biggest fish in a small pond than to be a medium-to-large-sized fish in a giant pond. That line of thinking doesn't make a whole lot of sense to us in this case, since Kennedy basically has a job for life in the Senate, whereas the governorship of Louisiana is pretty weak, power-wise, and is term-limited.

What presumably sealed the deal for Kennedy, however, was that victory was far from a sure thing. The Republican field is loaded and, even if he landed the nomination, Louisiana is like many Southern states in that it elects Republicans to nearly all federal offices, but is more than willing to elect Democrats as governor. The current governor of the state, John Bel Edwards, is a Democrat, as have been four of the six governors before him. Actually, you can make that 13 of the last 15 before him, if you really want, but that's cheating because then you're including the era of one-party, Southern Democratic rule.

Anyhow, the Senator has clearly decided that a Senate term in the hand is better than two gubernatorial terms in the bush. It was not especially likely that the Democrats would have won the seat, even if it was open, so Kennedy's decision doesn't affect the 2024 math in any meaningful way. (Z)

Shapiro Goes Off the Board

In most states that have a secretary of state (Hawaii, Alaska, and Utah do not), it is an elected position. In 11 states, however, the SoS is appointed. Pennsylvania is among the states in the latter group; the Keystone State gives that power to its governor (most others give it to the state legislature). If Doug Mastriano (R) had been elected last November, he had promised to appoint a fire-breathing Trumpy Republican to the post, so that he and the SoS could work together to bend election outcomes to their will.

Of course, Mastriano did not win, Josh Shapiro (D) did. And yesterday, Shapiro announced his nominee for secretary of state. It's Al Schmidt... a Republican. Bet you didn't see that coming. Certainly we didn't.

However, the pick actually makes all the sense in the world. First of all, Schmidt clearly has the résumé for the job—for 10 years he served as a city commissioner in Philadelphia, which meant he was one of the people (there are three commissioners) responsible for administering elections. And in that job, he proved to be a public servant first and a Republican second; famously pushing back against Donald Trump's claims in 2020. Schmidt even testified before the 1/6 Committee.

As a tactical matter, Schmidt is more likely than a Democrat to be approved by the state Senate, where Republicans have a five-person majority. The appointment also sends the message to voters, in a purple state, that Shapiro is willing to reach across the aisle. And finally, if and when Trumpy Republicans whine and moan about election results in 2024 (and 2026, and beyond), that whining and moaning will have considerably less credibility with a Republican running the show.

Since announcing his candidacy for governor, Shapiro has demonstrated that his political skills are considerable. There's talk that he's got a future in national politics and, more and more, that talk does not seem to be misplaced. (Z)

This Week in Schadenfreude: Sometimes It Writes Itself

Yesterday, reader J.K. in Silverdale, WA, sent us a brief message: "Well, I guess this week's schadenfreude item can write itself." And just in case we couldn't figure out what J.K. was talking about, the lead story on Politico, as we write this, is headlined: "Dems bask in the speaker schadenfreude."

Let us remind everyone that every bit of schadenfreude that McCarthy inspires is richly deserved. He voted against certifying the 2020 election results and, in various other ways, enabled the insurrection. He's thrown longtime, loyal allies like Liz Cheney under the bus in the venal quest for power. He's pointedly remained silent while Donald Trump embraced antisemitism and white supremacy. He's promised to use his powers as speaker, if he ever gets them, to punish his opponents. And all of this is just in the last couple of years. He was no peach even when he was coming up the ranks. Readers with a long memory may recall, for example, that his pet issue for many years was limiting abortions to "forcible rapes." Regardless of one's position on abortion rights, this is pretty skeezy because it implies that some rapes (presumably statutory rapes) really aren't so bad. It is also worth remembering that McCarthy was a serious candidate for the speakership once before, in 2015, and Republicans decided he was icky enough that they passed him over in favor of Paul Ryan.

The problem, when it comes to this item, is that we can't exactly explain why McCarthy is worthy of schadenfreude attention this week. The item at the top of the page, and the two items we wrote previously, explain it quite thoroughly. So instead, we are going to run down the 10 best jokes at McCarthy's expense we've seen this week:

1. Rep. Chuy García (D-IL) put this picture on his Twitter feed:
   
   
   
   The caption is: "The only Kevin that can defend a house."
   
   
2. Given what happened with Liz Truss, this has already become something of a cliché. That said, it's still funny:
   
   
   
   As you can see from the logo in the corner, the folks at the Lincoln Project seem to have beaten everyone else to the punch.
   
   
3. This was put together by the staff of The Daily Show with Stephen Colbert:
   
   
   
   
4. When an absurd situation emerges, it's rare that there isn't some relevant bit from Monty Python available for deployment. This week, the Black Knight scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail has been making the rounds:
   
   
   
   For those unfamiliar with the movie, the key line is "'Tis but a scratch."
   
   
5. From Twitter: "You ever leave a job and secretly hope everything will fall apart once you're gone?"
   
   "Nancy Pelosi is living your dream."
   
   
6. The 1A headline on the satirical website The Onion right now is "Incredibly Productive House Of Representatives Assembles For 8th Vote In Just 3 Days"
   
   
7. This image is all over the place on Twitter:
   
   
   
   It is accompanied by the text: "Kevin McCarthy has lost the Speaker of the House SIX TIMES... One... Two... Three... Four... Five... Six Times!"
   
   That said, whoever wrote this forgot to observe that this week's House deliberations are brought to you by the letters "F" and "U."
   
   
8. From the comments section of DailyKos: "Things like this never happened when I was Speaker of the House" - George Santos
   
   
9. Presented without comment: www.haskevinmccarthybeenelectedspeaker.com/
   
   
10. And finally, one of the finest memes of any sort we've ever seen:
    
    
    
    

If the Republicans don't bring this baby home soon, one can only imagine the sort of snark that next week will bring. (Z)

This Week in Freudenfreude: That's a Lot Of Bills

The only news story this week that came close to the Speaker's race, in terms of the amount of oxygen it consumed, is the tale of Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin. Presumably, many/most readers are aware of what happened. But for those who are not, Hamlin made a routine tackle during the first quarter of Sunday's Bills-Bengals game. However, the hit—for reasons that are yet to be established, though there are a couple of probable explanations—caused his heart to stop beating. He collapsed on the field, and was clinically dead for some period of time. He had to be resuscitated twice, and eventually he was whisked away in an ambulance.

The first bit of good news is that while Hamlin is still in critical condition, he's regained consciousness, and it appears he will recover. His first words, after he emerged from an induced coma, were to wonder if his team won the game. We don't know if it was a hospital staffer or a family member who broke the news to him that the game was stopped after his injury, and was ultimately canceled.

The second bit of good news is that Hamlin, on reaching the NFL, created a charitable foundation called the "Chasing M's Foundation." "M's" stands for "Millions," which was not meant literally, but as a metaphor for success. And the first act of that foundation was a GoFundMe fundraiser meant to raise $2,500 to buy Christmas toys for children in Hamlin's community. That's a pretty modest amount, but the fundraiser struggled to get off the ground. There are, after all, a lot of players in the NFL and Hamlin is not a star like Tom Brady or Aaron Rodgers or Aaron Donald.

It's not struggling to get off the ground anymore, though. And the "M's" in "Chasing M's" isn't metaphorical anymore, either. The Bills' fanbase is famous for its generosity, and others across the NFL and across the country also wanted a way to show support for Hamlin. And so, the donations have been rolling in. As of this writing, the total take is a staggering $7,759,950. There can't be many GoFundMe pages that have a status line that reads: "$7,759,950 raised of $2,500 goal."

What does this have to do with politics? Not much. But it's a good story. Plus, we're going to answer a question or two about this situation in tomorrow's Q&A. So, we're going to use that fact to sneak this item in through the back door. (Z)

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