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October 25, 2023
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PRESENTED BY
THE TOP
Happy Wednesday morning.
We have a new GOP speaker nominee. The fourth in three weeks. And the second in just one day. But this time may be different.
Late Tuesday night, the House Republican Conference tapped Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.) as its speaker designate. Johnson won with 128 votes in the secret-ballot election and had minimal opposition during a roll-call vote.
We’re going to get to the outlook for Johnson in a minute. Let’s just pause for a second and recognize that this is Day 22 with no speaker. On Tuesday alone, the House GOP had two speaker nominees. House Majority Whip Tom Emmer lasted only four hours and 10 minutes before withdrawing. Johnson was elected after 10 p.m.
In case you haven’t Googled him yet, Johnson is a 51-year-old, fourth-term member of the House. He’s the House Republican Conference vice chair. He’s got a pair of degrees from Louisiana State University and has seats on the Judiciary and Armed Services committees. His district, which hugs the western part of the state, is as red as they come. It’s also home to some big military facilities, including Barksdale Air Force Base and Fort Johnson.
Johnson could be the first former chair of the Republican Study Committee to become speaker.
The Louisiana Republican is the son of a Shreveport firefighter badly injured and disabled on the job. The now congressman worked as a college professor, conservative talk radio host and columnist. But it was his roles on behalf of several religious groups — as an attorney and spokesperson — that launched his political career. Johnson is married with four children. If he’s elected, Johnson will enter the speakership as a man with exceedingly modest means. Johnson has at least $280,000 in debt and no disclosed assets.
Just FYI, Bres has been saying Johnson will be the speaker for months, so props are deserved.
Here are some things to keep in mind during the next 24 hours.
1) Johnson stands a good chance of getting to 217. After former Speaker Kevin McCarthy, he may be the best positioned of any House Republican to do so. Johnson can lose only four votes, so this will be tough. But he can make it. Both House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan, who failed in their own speaker bids, have offered support.
Three GOP lawmakers voted “present” last night in the private GOP-only roll-call vote, as we scooped: Reps. Mark Amodei (Nev.), French Hill (Ark.) and Thomas Massie (Ky.).
There were another 23 absences. This is where Johnson’s problems will be, if he has any. Some may be holdouts, but there was also an event last night that some GOP lawmakers attended instead of the vote.
Republicans who missed the vote include Emmer and Rep. Guy Reschenthaler (R-Pa.), the chief deputy whip who ran Emmer’s speaker campaign. They both will support Johnson on the floor.
Other Republicans missing the roll call include Reps. John Rose (Tenn.), Derrick Van Orden (Wis.), David Joyce (Ohio), Julia Letlow (La.) and Mike Simpson (Idaho).
2) If Republicans can’t elect Johnson as speaker, the game is up. Moderate Republicans will go to the floor and join with Democrats to elect Speaker Pro Tem Patrick McHenry for some indeterminate period of time. The House has been without a speaker for 22 days. Members are fed up with the paralysis.
Yet this actually works in Johnson’s favor. If Republicans rally around him, they’ll end up with a speaker elected by just GOP lawmakers without owing Democrats anything.
3) The floor proceedings will start at noon today. House Democrats expect their entire caucus to be in attendance. House Republicans think they will have close to full attendance as well. So Johnson will likely need 217 to win.
4) Republicans believe that Johnson is a safe bet across the broad spectrum of the GOP conference. Yes, he’s very conservative. The Louisiana Republican was one of the main GOP election deniers in 2020. But Johnson isn’t a public firebrand like Jordan. Johnson is more difficult to demonize because he has a low profile.
5) Should Johnson win, there will be Louisianans as No. 1 and No. 2 at the leadership table. This is incredibly unusual.
But with Johnson’s lack of experience at the top rung of the party, Scalise could become one of the most powerful majority leaders in recent memory.
6) Johnson isn’t a big fundraiser, and this is a problem. He has $1.1 million on hand in his reelection account and a measly $83,441 in his leadership PAC. Whether you like it or not, the House Republican political machine is powered by six- and seven-figure contributions to the Congressional Leadership Fund, the GOP leadership-linked super PAC. This is something that Johnson has to begin to think about — and quickly.
7) As we mentioned in the Tuesday AM edition, the next speaker will be immediately tossed into the fire. Johnson will be thrown into a room with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and President Joe Biden to solve the government-funding standoff. This is like advancing straight from tee-ball to the majors.
Consider this: Johnson has a staff of 13 in D.C. McCarthy had a staff of more than 35. Should he win, Johnson is going to have to move quickly to assemble a team that can handle the Herculean task of managing the House Republican Conference. It’ll be interesting to see whether Johnson dips into the current leadership ranks for help or whether he starts anew.
Johnson isn’t planning any conference meeting before the vote today, and his allies were working the phones late into the night in a bid to nail everyone down.
We’ll have much more about this potentially huge leadership shakeup throughout today and the rest of the week. But we’ll note this from our friend Melanie Zanona at CNN — the McCarthy sign over the entrance to the speaker’s office came down Tuesday night.
— Jake Sherman, John Bresnahan, Mica Soellner and Max Cohen
November Event: Join us on Tuesday, Nov. 7 at 9 a.m. as we sit down with Rep. Kat Cammack (R-Fla.) to discuss 5G leadership and news of the day. Afterward, Meredith Attwell Baker, CTIA president and CEO, will join us for a fireside chat. RSVP.
New Partnership: We are excited to announce a new Punchbowl News partner — Goldman Sachs One Million Black Women. We’ll kick off the new series “Uplifting Black Women” with Reps. Shontel Brown (D-Ohio) and Nikema Williams (D-Ga.) on Thursday, Nov. 14 at 5 p.m. Join Punchbowl News founder and CEO Anna Palmer and MSNBC anchor Symone Sanders-Townsend as they discuss the disparities impacting Black women, including those in health, finance and education with the lawmakers. RSVP.
THE SENATE
Senate moves forward on supplemental as obstacles mount
Senate leaders say they’re charging ahead with legislation to fund key national-security priorities, even as divisions between — and within — the parties emerge.
Democratic leaders on Tuesday shut down the notion of using the bill to enact an overhaul of border-related policies, while Republicans insist that’s the only way to truly address the crisis. Meanwhile, internal GOP strife over linking aid for Israel and Ukraine is growing.
Senate Republicans hosted former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at their lunch on Tuesday as GOP leaders look to build support for addressing the nation’s biggest foreign-policy challenges in one bill.
According to attendees, Rice encouraged GOP senators to not allow the United States to “retreat” from global conflicts like Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan. Her message was well-received by much of the GOP conference, but conservatives who oppose new Ukraine aid were unmoved.
“There’s a lot of building discontent” within the conference, said one GOP senator granted anonymity to candidly assess the meeting.
Some Republicans urged caution about the hand-wringing over Biden’s funding request, noting that this is usually the time when everyone lays down their markers ahead of negotiations.
“Let’s get down to very specific provisions and then let’s talk. Because before that, everybody’s reacting to hypotheticals,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) told us. “It’s premature.”
Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.), the Senate’s House whisperer, said he sees the criticisms as simply an effort to “make the bill better.”
“There may be a few holdouts, but I think most of us are trying to make it better,” Mullin said.
The goal is for the Senate to write its own bipartisan bill based on the White House’s funding request, which is merely a list of recommendations. While Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and many top Republicans agree with the idea of combining these into one funding package, Senate negotiators could simply conclude that there isn’t enough bipartisan support for certain elements of the proposal.
The border security portion is shaping up to be difficult, if not impossible, to craft. Democrats are insisting that anything beyond a straight funding patch is a non-starter. And Republicans want policy changes, arguing the current approach essentially asks them to provide more funding for border policies they oppose.
“Biden’s goal is to make it more efficient to bring more people illegally and place them around the country,” Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) told us. “If that’s the conclusion, we have to make sure that that’s not a bill that will pass.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said Tuesday that neither side should seek partisan priorities because it would imperil the entire package. But McConnell, who has hammered the Biden administration for its handling of the border, is backing up his conference for now.
“There’s a lot of passion among our members about having a credible border security provision in there, and we’re going to make other changes as well,” McConnell said.
There’s also discussion of forcing into the package a provision that would freeze $6 billion in Iranian assets that were unlocked as part of a recent prisoner-swap agreement. The Biden administration has paused the disbursement of those funds in the wake of Hamas’ terror attacks in Israel, but Republicans and some Democrats want to codify that freeze into law.
And there are some early signs that Schumer could be amenable to this. When asked about the Biden administration’s initial approach to Iran — which included trying to resurrect the Iran nuclear deal — Schumer said the agreement “didn’t have enough to deter Iran from funding terrorism around the globe, and I still believe that.”
Of course, Schumer voted against the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. But in this context, he’s suggesting that the rapprochement strategy the administration initially pursued was a flawed one because it didn’t prevent Iran’s financing of terror groups like Hamas.
— Andrew Desiderio
Brown is skeptical about new Iran sanctions legislation
News: The chair of the Senate Banking Committee doesn’t think Congress needs to pass new sanctions legislation targeting Iran.
Sen. Sherrod Brown’s (D-Ohio) committee is set to hold a hearing Thursday on how the U.S. government can better combat “networks of illicit finance and terrorism.”
But when asked about legislation targeting Iran with new sanctions, Brown doesn’t see an immediate need for Congress to act.
Much ado has been made about $6 billion in Iranian assets that were briefly unfrozen as part of a prisoner exchange with the United States only to be re-frozen after the deadly Hamas attack on Israel earlier this month.
“We’ve publicly said it should be frozen,” Brown said, referring to that $6 billion figure. But Brown added, “I don’t think we need legislation.” The Ohio Democrat said he had spoken with Biden administration officials and was “confident that it’s frozen and should stay frozen.”
As we reported Tuesday night, there’s bipartisan interest in legislation that would mandate the freeze. That includes Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), the top Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, who introduced the Revoke Iranian Funding Act on Oct. 17.
But if Brown doesn’t join the effort, his committee’s jurisdiction over sanctions will make it into a bit of a chokepoint.
— Brendan Pedersen
PRESENTED BY JPMORGAN CHASE
PUNCHBOWL NEWS EVENTS
Did you miss our event Tuesday with Rep. Steven Horsford (D-Nev.) discussing the race to find a new House speaker, private equity, and more? You can watch the full recording here.
Plus: Tuesday afternoon, Punchbowl News CEO and Founder Anna Palmer sat down for a roundtable discussion with Virginia Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin and RTX Chairman and CEO Greg Hayes. The conversation focused on the future of the aerospace and defense industry and how the industry is approaching supply chains, talent pipelines and innovation. The event was hosted by RTX to commemorate the opening of its new headquarters in Arlington, Va.
At the ribbon cutting: Virginia Secretary of Commerce and Trade Caren Merrick; Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates Todd Gilbert; Leanne Caret, RTX board member; RTX’s Jeff Shockey, Christopher Calio and Pamela Erickson; and Erin Streeter of the National Association of Manufacturers.
AND THERE’S MORE…
News: Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-Ariz.) is endorsing Arizona’s state House Speaker Ben Toma to succeed her in Congress. Lesko told us the news in an interview in the Capitol on Tuesday.
Toma immigrated to the United States from Romania in the 1980s and was a business leader before entering politics. Toma hasn’t announced he’s running yet, Lesko said.
Abe Hamadeh, a close ally of Kari Lake and the attorney general candidate last cycle, is also mounting a run in the GOP primary.
In other news: House Minority Whip Katherine Clark raised $1.38M for the DCCC at the annual WomenLEAD lunch Tuesday. Clark co-hosted the ninth annual lunch with Reps. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.), Deborah Ross (D-N.C.) and Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas).
— Max Cohen and Heather Caygle
PRESENTED BY JPMORGAN CHASE
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