The Republicans of the 118th Congress 2023-2025
They know how to lie and obstruct justice, but do they know how to govern?
Photo Credit: Heartland Signal
Issue #220 Government January 12, 2023
It is going to be a wild next two years with the Republicans having a very slim majority in the House of Representatives. Currently, the Republicans have 222 members while the Democrats have 212 members (including 3 Independents who may or may not caucus with the Democrats) in the 118th Congress. However, that will most likely change soon.
Virginia 4th District Democratic Representative A. Donald McEachin died right after the November 2022 midterms after battling cancer. A special election will be held for that seat on February 21, 2023. Current Democratic State Senator Jennifer McClellan is running for the seat, which she is expected to win in the heavily Democratic district. If that happens, she will be the first Black woman to represent Virginia in the U.S. House of Representatives. Her election would also reduce the Republican majority needed to pass bills from 6 votes to 5.
And then there’s newly seated George Santos (R-NY, if that’s even his real name…)
Santos has admitted to lying and, as of January 2023, is under investigation by federal, state, county, and Brazilian authorities. He also claims to have dual American and Brazilian citizenship.
There have been many calls for Santos to resign, including from the Nassau County (NY) Republican Committee and four other House Republicans. Santos declared he will not resign.
When asked about all of the legal troubles Santos has, the new Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) stated that “…everyone is considered innocent until proven guilty…” and that this situation would be taken up by the House Ethics Committee. That would have been true in the 117th Congress, but one of the things McCarthy wants to be done is to eliminate the Ethics Committee, primarily because so many current Republican House members are implicated in the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
The article continues below.
No intrusive ads or annoying popups ever! Instead, please see the important information below and at the bottom of this post. That’s how we grow and sustain this publication. AND, please keep those “Likes” and comments coming! Thanks!
There is new lower pricing for the paid levels!
Paid subscribers with the Substack app are invited to participate in the W.A.S. Chat Room to discuss today’s post.
All posts are free for seven days after their publication. To read all older posts, including the complete archive, and to support us financially, please consider upgrading your subscription to a paid level. Save 17% with an annual subscription. Thank you for your support!
The article continues…
Speaking of the Speaker, it took a historic fifteen votes and several questionable concessions to the MAGA House members for McCarthy to finally be elected Speaker at about 12:30 am on January 7, 2023. The last time House Speaker elections took this many votes was exactly one hundred years ago in 1923 when it took three days and nine ballots to elect Republican Frederick H. Gillett.
The record for electing a Speaker of the House was set in 1856 when it took two months and 133 votes to secure the speakership for Republican Nathaniel Banks of Massachusetts.
Members of the 118th House of Representatives, including George Santos, were finally sworn in at about 1:00 am on Saturday, January 7, 2023, and on Monday, January 9, the House Republicans started announcing their priorities for this congressional session.
The five legislative “priorities” of the 222 Republican House members of the 118th Congress
After voting on the new House Rules package, which gave outsized influence to the MAGA House members, the Republicans started working on their stated legislation for this session.
Speaker McCarthy also stated that he intended to remove three Democrats from committees:
Adam Schiff of California is slated to be removed from the House Intelligence Committee primarily because he was the lead impeachment manager for Donald Trump’s first impeachment trial, was a manager for the 2nd impeachment trial, and participated in the discussions about Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Eric Swalwell, also of California and on the Intelligence Committee, was called a “national security threat” by McCarthy because he had contact with an alleged Chinese spy. Swalwell was also a manager for Trump’s second impeachment trial.
Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, who is an immigrant from Somalia and one of four Muslims in the House, is slated to be removed from the House Foreign Affairs Committee because McCarthy and other MAGA Republicans described her as anti-Semitic and anti-American.
McCarthy can act to remove Schiff and Swalwell from their committees himself, but the full House will have to vote with a simple majority (218) to remove Omar from the Foreign Affairs Committee.
As promised, the House Republicans will spend the majority of their time implementing their version of “revenge politics,” including ongoing investigations of Joe, Hunter, and James Biden (President Biden’s brother), while conveniently ignoring their own high crimes and misdemeanors, election denialism, and links to the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol Building.
Almost all of the proposed bills from the MAGA wing of the House will be dead on arrival in the U.S. Senate, and President Joe Biden has vowed to veto any House proposals that attempt to upend his unprecedented legislative successes in the first two years of his administration.
Rescinding new funding for the IRS. As part of the recent Inflation Reduction Act, $80 billion was set aside for the Internal Revenue Service. The funds are intended to increase tax enforcement and compliance by the super-rich as well as pay for the hiring of about 87,000 new IRS employees. Most of those new hires over the next ten years would replace retiring employees, as well as increase the administrative IRS staff.
However, the Republicans are pushing the lie that the new IRS employees would show up on the doorsteps of regular American taxpayers and small business owners to audit them. This is just not true. The real reason for the Republicans’ ire is that they much prefer working on behalf of the super-rich instead of regular middle- and low-income Americans.
To start their attack on the IRS, the Republicans voted on a bill by the House by Nebraska Rep. Adrian Smith's "Family and Small Business Protection Act." The bill would rescind $72 billion of the $80 billion for the Internal Revenue Service. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that Smith's proposal will raise the deficit by more than $114 billion over the next 10 years, but the House Republicans voted for it anyway.
Establishing a select committee on competition with China. On Tuesday, the House, with a bi-partisan vote, approved a resolution creating a "Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party." The 16-member panel is tasked with investigating and submitting policy recommendations "on the status of the Chinese Communist Party's economic, technological, and security progress and its competition with the United States." The White House said it looks forward to working with the issues targeted by this select committee.
Establishing a select subcommittee on "weaponization of the federal government.” Tasked with investigating the federal investigators, the panel will be composed of up to 13 lawmakers. Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio is set to take over the Judiciary Committee. Although most of the Republicans ignored subpoenas issued by the now-defunct Select Committee to Investigate the January 6 Attack on the Capitol, this select committee will authorize the Judiciary Committee chairman to issue subpoenas to be returned to the select subcommittee. Republicans are intent on “investigating” the FBI and the DOJ for their investigations of Donald Trump, from the Russian probe to the court-ordered seizure of sensitive government documents illegally brought to the Mar-a-Lago resort.
Condemning attacks on churches, anti-abortion rights facilities and groups. Introduced by Representative Mike Johnson (R-LA), the resolution accuses the Biden administration of failing to take action in response to the attacks on the anti-abortion rights advocates and churches or protect the organizations. The proposed bill highlights acts of vandalism at pregnancy centers, offices of anti-abortion rights organizations and churches since the May leak of a Supreme Court draft opinion overturning Roe v. Wade.
Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise is advancing the lie that doctors are murdering babies who survived abortion attempts. He wants those doctors charged with murder. This proposed bill requires that healthcare practitioners who are present at the live birth exercise skill, care, and diligence to preserve the life and health of the child that is offered to any other child born at the same gestation age. —the same degree of care that would be offered to any other child born prematurely of the same gestational age. After those efforts, the healthcare workers must transport and admit the child to a hospital.
Although the Republicans emphasized topics such as inflation, high food and gas prices, and border security during the 2022 midterm elections, none of the five immediate priorities tackle those issues.
However, the MAGA Republicans in the House have pledged to call before Congress and/or impeach Dr. Anthony Fauci, as many Biden family members as possible, including President Joe Biden and Dr. Jill Biden, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas, and now Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg because of the January 11, 2023, FAA outage caused by a damaged database file that is used to alert pilots to safety issues.
And of course, the #1 issue for the Republicans in the House is to investigate Hunter Biden’s laptop.
What are your thoughts on the new Republican House Majority? Let us know in the comments or in the W.A.S. Chat Room (for paid subscribers only).
Help us to grow our We Are Speaking Substack!
Don’t Forget! If you have the W.A.S. app for iOS and Android, you can listen to each article by clicking the little headset icon. You can also participate in the W.A.S. Chat (for paid subscribers only).
There are many benefits to using the W.A.S. app, including the ability to listen to our posts and podcast episodes straight from the app.
Paid Subscribers: Join us in the new W.A.S. Chat!
Have you thought about starting a Substack publication of your own? It’s quick, easy, and free!
I am concentrating much more on my Instagram account. Please click the link to follow me on my ‘Gram.
I am also now on the new, left-leaning, and easy-to-use “Bird Alternative” blogging site called POST. You can follow me there. (Your wait to be admitted will be much shorter than the usual week or so with my dedicated invite below…)
You can always leave any questions in the comments or email us.
Free posts are available for 7 days after publication. Adjust or upgrade your subscription to the paid level here. Pay less than 14¢ per post for the 36 monthly articles and podcast episodes. Thank you for your financial support!
Read Detroit Stories Quarterly by Keith Owens, et al.
Check out the Global Creative Community Branding and Marketing Academy (GCC BMA) offering courses and group coaching for independent writers and creative and solo professionals.