Today’s big story in the U.S. House was supposed to be the vote on a bipartisan appropriations “minibus” bill funding much of the federal government and ending any threat of a shutdown prior to the end of the fiscal year in October. And indeed, the minibus passed with more Democratic than Republican votes amid a lot of renewed House Freedom Caucus grumbling about the weakness and infidelity of Republican leaders, including Speaker Mike Johnson, who helped negotiate and the backed the bill.
But unexpected drama erupted just prior to this vote when Marjorie Taylor Greene (who was booted out of the HFC allegedly because of her coziness with Johnson’s ejected predecessor, Kevin McCarthy) filed a “motion to vacate the chair” (the procedural device that led to McCarthy losing his gavel last year). She quickly explained that it was in response to the current speaker’s perfidy on spending, as Politico reported:
“This is a betrayal of the American people. This is a betrayal of Republican voters,” Greene said after the funding package passed. “The clock has started. It’s time for our conference to pick a new speaker.”
The way these ejection procedures work, however, required that Greene file her firebomb as a “privileged motion,” which she did not do, at least yet. And she explained that this was a warning to Johnson rather than an immediate revolt, reported NBC News:
Greene told reporters that the motion to vacate was “more of a warning than a pink slip,” saying she does not want to “throw the House into chaos,” like the three and a half weeks that the chamber was without a speaker when McCarthy was ousted.
The warning, according to Axios, was that Johnson better not double down on his evil ways by bringing up a Ukraine aid bill, as the Biden administration, a majority of Senate Republicans, and a sizable minority of House Republicans are hoping he will do, and as he has recently hinted he might do. Aid to both Ukraine and to Israel was part of a Senate supplemental appropriations package that was killed in the upper chamber last month thanks to a border-policy deal included in it that immigration hardliners (and more importantly, Donald Trump) opposed. But Greene is in the House GOP faction bitterly opposed to further aid to Ukraine. So from her point of view (and perhaps that of her master down in Mar-a-Lago), any move by Johnson to let a Ukraine aid bill get to the floor would represent a complete and unacceptable surrender to Biden.
Johnson now has a choice. He can knuckle under to MTG’s threat and draw onto himself whatever opprobrium will be associated with the consequences for Ukraine. Or he can ask House Democrats to reverse what they did when McCarthy was ejected and oppose a motion to vacate the chair, which they’ve indicated they might well do if he moves a Ukraine aid bill, notes Politico:
“It’s not a question of saving Mike Johnson,” seconded Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.). “I’ll make a common cause and an alliance with anybody in Congress who will try to save the Ukrainian people at this point.”
Receiving even a backhanded compliment from Jamie Raskin is not healthy for a Republican House Speaker these days, particularly one like Johnson who has pretty much used up his political capital with the hard-core conservatives of his conference. With the GOP majority presently down to two votes, he doesn’t have much of a margin for error. Perhaps he can lurch forward with Democratic help and hope his colleagues are too focused on the November elections to cooperate with MTG in executing a coup. Or he can just make Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin happy by ignoring the needs of Ukraine. But it looks like he will have to make a fateful choice.
