House Majority Whip Tom Emmer was our guest on Thursday’s Fly Out Day. We’ve now had all the top elected members of the House Republican and Democratic leadership on the show, which posts every Thursday on YouTube.
Let’s examine Emmer in the context of the broader House GOP leadership.
Speaker Mike Johnson has reached the pinnacle of congressional power, although there’s no telling how Johnson’s tenure will go. Two of the last three Republican speakers — Kevin McCarthy and John Boehner — were forced out. Johnson, who conservatives also tried to dump, has President Donald Trump’s full support, and that’s exceedingly valuable in today’s GOP.
Then there’s Emmer and House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, two very different figures with different styles and worldviews.
Scalise is a veteran vote counter who has survived the sometimes ugly leadership wars of the McCarthy, Boehner and Paul Ryan eras.
Emmer, first elected to the House in 2014, came up through the NRCC, mostly building his political identity in the wake of Republicans losing the House in 2018. Emmer led the NRCC for two cycles, helping win the majority in 2022. He’s a sharp political mind and, as whip, should have as much interaction with rank-and-file Republicans as anyone.
We talked to Emmer about a host of challenges and opportunities that Republicans face over the next six months.
Remember that Congress is a dynamic institution. We’ve just gotten over a major crisis — the 43-day government shutdown — and are on the brink of two more legislative flashpoints. In just 47 days, enhanced Obamacare premium tax credits expire. And in 77 days, the government will run out of money again unless there’s a bipartisan funding deal.
Shut down. Let’s start briefly by looking backwards. Democrats did instigate the shutdown — there’s no doubt about that — but that argument clearly hasn’t stuck with the public. Most polling shows that voters blame Trump and Republicans for the shutdown, something that has deeply frustrated many in the GOP leadership.
“You know how I feel about polls, Jake,” Emmer said. “People use polls that they believe say what they want them to say, and people reject polls that don’t. Realistically, I think when this is all said and done, nobody wins in a shutdown.”
Emmer’s view is that the shutdown is immaterial when voters start focusing on who to support next year.
“The attention span of America is a nanosecond. We move on to whatever is the next big thing like that,” Emmer said.
The Minnesota Republican continued:
“So, no, I don’t think this will be the issue. The issue will be the economy, the issue will be do people feel like they are in a better place than they were when Donald Trump was first elected and does their economic future look bright? I think that is going to be the key to the midterms.”
The election. OK so let’s talk about the election. Emmer’s view on 2026 is a bit different than Johnson’s. Johnson says at every opportunity he has that Republicans will keep and expand the majority next year. Emmer is a bit more measured:
“It’s too early for anybody on my side or otherwise to prognosticate that, oh, the House is going to flip, et cetera. Those assessments will become more clear as we get to next spring, next summer and obviously, as we move into the fall. I’m telling you, it is all about the economy. We have the argument they do not.”
Emmer told us that many of the GOP’s policies — no tax on tips, no tax on overtime and the permanency of their tax cuts — will take two years to sink into the economic picture.
“You should start feeling it next spring and next summer, and it should be improving right through,” Emmer said. “If that’s correct, yeah, we’re gonna hold the House.”
Health care. What this shutdown has guaranteed is that Republicans are going to spend the next few months trying to create their own health care proposal. Most veteran Republicans who remember the first Trump administration understand this is probably an exercise in futility.
But the Republican leadership has grown so dug in against a simple extension of the ACA tax credits that they really have no choice except to pursue some other option.
Emmer argued that “Donald Trump and Republicans are going to have to fix” the nation’s health care system. He mentioned health savings accounts and structures that would allow small businesses to pool insurance plans.
Yet the sixth-term lawmaker did allow that there may be a situation in which Congress needs to renew the credits to give certainty to the marketplace.
“We got to stop just pumping money into fat and happy health insurers at the expense of the American people’s ability to have choice, have transparency and literally have competition in the marketplace,” Emmer said.
We asked Emmer if Congress can pass a health care plan before the credits expire at the end of the year.
“Anything is possible,” Emmer said.
Funding. This is interesting. Emmer said that he hopes Congress will finish work on the FY2026 spending by the end of December. The deadline is Jan. 30.
“I would like to see us getting it done around Christmas, rather than waiting till January,” Emmer said. We’ll take the over.
Emmer added: “I would love to see that done. Are you kidding? As the whip? Do you really want me to be working at the end of January trying to find those last few votes? I’d rather be doing that right at the end of the year and get it done.”
