It’s like 1985 all over again! This time, it’s not nearly as cool, but at least there’s one more thing in common. House Republicans seem to be in dire straits even before they officially take control of the lower chamber in less than a month.

Thanks to their surpassingly small majority — a result of a disappointing red-ripple midterm — the GOP caucus has mired itself in a fight over leadership. Kevin McCarthy has the support of most House Republicans, but the Freedom Caucus continues to balk at supporting McCarthy, whom they see as insufficiently conservative. Negotiations have made some progress at resolving the impasse before the start of the next session, but Freedom Caucus members want a specific concession — and McCarthy’s supporters are afraid he will cave and give it to them.

The concession? A renewed rule restoring the motion to vacate the chair (MTV) that would throw the House back into a Speaker election if used:

McCarthy’s camp hoped they had settled with the GOP conference’s conservatives on a deal requiring a majority of its members to support a motion to vacate. But the right price to rein in the California Republican’s rowdy detractors is likely going to be lower than that.

Which leaves McCarthy backers like Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) openly musing about how much to empower conservatives with the ability to “hijack or extort” their future leader.

“Congress can’t become a three-ring circus,” Fitzpatrick said of the debate over how high to set the number of House members required to force a vote on toppling a speaker. “There’s got to be law and order. It’s got to be a functioning institution.”

Fitzpatrick’s worries seem justified when hearing Rep. Chip Roy discuss how the Freedom Caucus envisions its use. Roy wants his MTV old-style, B.P. (before Pelosi):

Re the motion to vacate — i spoke w @chiproytx about it yesterday. his point about vacate is that in the early 1900s, the floor was wide open so any lawmaker could head to the chamber and call for a motion. if it got seconded, you were in business. mostly true.

— Jake Sherman (@JakeSherman) December 15, 2022

That would mean having to hold no-confidence votes with a nine-seat majority every time two members grew disaffected with caucus leadership. If Republicans had a 30-seat majority, this would be no more than an annoyance. At 222-213, however, Democrats could easily combine with rebellious Republicans and topple the Speaker, perhaps even resulting in a Democrat winning the post.

Roy’s allies see this as a way to force accountability in leadership more than a chaos engine, however:

One Freedom Caucus member who is trying to find middle ground with leadership, Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.), called the ability to vote on deposing a speaker “incredibly important,” given that the House leader “works for the members of Congress that elected” him or her.

“It’s part of what holds the most senior leadership in Congress accountable,” Clyde said of the motion to vacate the chair.

That does not appeal at all to most of the rest of the caucus, which wants to focus on setting up an agenda for the 2024 campaign. A hard-right agenda forced by the Freedom Caucus may interfere with that, but with an old-school MTV hanging over McCarthy’s head, he might not have a lot of choice. That rankles the larger majority of the caucus, who see that as extortion by a small minority.

The solution may be a compromise on just how many members it takes to get an MTV to the floor. McCarthy won’t accept “two” as the number, and the Freedom Caucus won’t accept 112, which is what it takes in the Pelosi version (a majority of the majority caucus). Is there a number in between that will work? Both sides are trying to find one, but …

Some GOP lawmakers have indicated the price for a motion to vacate vote should be about one-third of the conference, or roughly 75 members, others have suggested the number 50.

No matter where the magic number lands, the purpose would be the same: Agreeing to it could help McCarthy pick up votes for speaker while protecting him with a high enough threshold that the Freedom Caucus couldn’t boot him on its own. That doesn’t mean every McCarthy backer wants him to play conservatives’ game, though — some are warning him not to give ground to a group they view as intent on derailing the future majority with needless drama.

In other words, this has become a test of McCarthy’s mettle for the majority and a test of his negotiating abilities with the minority. Perhaps that’s not a bad process to start a term as Speaker, but that’s only true if McCarthy can reach a compromise that eventually unites the caucus behind him.

However, that fight already has policy implications:

So it is that McCarthy’s internal GOP campaign for House speaker is colliding with year-end goals, including some that Democrats share with other Republicans on Capitol Hill. That could come at the expense of legislating this year and well beyond — and brings an early and telling clash with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

McCarthy has been working, in public and in private, to hold up a spending package that would avert a government shutdown and carry the status quo into what he hopes will be his speakership, starting in January.

The House on Wednesday night bought itself a week to finalize a larger spending deal, with an extension passing with the support of nine Republicans and the unanimous backing of Democrats.

The one-week CR takes some of the pressure off McCarthy and a bit of time to find a magic MTV number. In the end, though, House Republicans are going to have to find ways to work with Democrats and each other on some sort of budget. Starting off their majority with a government shutdown would be a huge political blunder, especially after the midterms made clear that voters have tired of chaos agents. That’s a message that the Freedom Caucus should have heard loudly and clearly from the failures of such candidates last month.

Anyway, if people really want their MTV in an old-school fashion, let’s recall this groundbreaking music video from Dire Straits in the days when MTV really meant “music television.” Money for Nothing also describes Congress pretty well, too.

The latest episode of The Ed Morrissey Show podcast is now up! Today’s show features:

•  What was Donald Trump’s “major announcement”?
• Duane Patterson and I started off the show trying to game out the possibilities … and we didn’t even come close. The news dropped while we were discussing it, and that’s when the fun really begins
• Plus, don’t miss my SRN/Townhall commentary for this week!

The Ed Morrissey Show is now a fully downloadable and streamable show at  Spotify, Apple Podcasts, the TEMS Podcast YouTube channel, and on Rumble and our own in-house portal at the #TEMS page!