If you caught any of the Sunday shows this weekend, two of the most sought-after guests were Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz of Florida and AOC of New York. That might sound like an odd combination at first glance, but CNN in particular wanted them because it was a rare occasion when they had something in common. Gaetz was making the rounds to announce that he plans to seek a motion to vacate and remove Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House, or at least try to do so. And AOC was telling anyone who would listen that she “would be happy” to vote to remove McCarthy. If you’re a Republican – particularly one of the more conservative ones from the Freedom Caucus – and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is agreeing with you about anything, that should probably send up some smoke signals. But it doesn’t appear to be deterring Gaetz for a moment. Just The News captured some of the congressman’s hot takes on why McCarthy needs to go.
Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz declared Sunday he will seek to oust Kevin McCarthy as House speaker after a drama-filled scramble to pass a federal budget forced a last-minute temporary spending bill that required Democrat votes to pass.
Gaetz, leader of a wing of fiscal conservatives that wanted all 12 federal agency spending bills passed instead of a continuing resolution, said McCarthy’s maneuvering on Saturday violated the deal he made in January to become Speaker.
“I do intend to file a motion to vacate against Speaker McCarthy this week,” Gaetz told CNN on Sunday morning.. “I think we need to rip off the band aid. I think we need to move on with new leadership that can be trustworthy.”
Now that the shutdown theater drama is behind us for at least six weeks or so, I’d been hoping that cooler heads might prevail for a while. That doesn’t appear to be the case, however.
I will first point out that I’ve been following Gaetz and his efforts to steer the House leadership in a more conservative direction for some time now. There’s plenty to like about the positions he has staked out and I believe that he and the rest of the Freedom Caucus provide a needed counterweight to some of the more “moderate” GOP members, some of whom are frankly just RINOs. He seems to have a firm grasp on the America First priorities that an increasingly large segment of the base gets behind.
I also understand some of the specific complaints he has raised about McCarthy. During the endless rounds of voting when Gaetz and some of his colleagues sought to block McCarthy from the Speakership, deals were put in place and promises were made, eventually allowing him to take the Gavel. McCarthy hasn’t been able to deliver on a number of promises he’s made to the Freedom Caucus and Gaetz is upset over that. I get it.
With all of that said, however, while I like Gaetz’s policy ideas and plans, I can’t get behind his approach because it’s simply unrealistic. McCarthy probably shouldn’t have made so many promises when he knew he would have such a slim majority, but I suppose he did what he needed to do to end the stonewalling. Yet Gaetz really needs to remember that McCarthy is dealing with a majority held in place by only a handful of votes. There’s only so much he can get done. And even most of the “victories” that the House GOP has managed to achieve have been more symbolic than anything else because they receive no support from the Senate and obviously none from the White House.
While legislative opportunities for victory may be few and far between, McCarthy has produced some dramatic results in setting up various committees to investigate the liberals’ weaponization and politicization of various segments of the government, as well as the corruption of the Biden family. With a strong showing next November, he could get a lot more done. Of course, if the House GOP majority grows significantly larger, that will water down the influence of the Freedom Caucus, so it’s a double-edged sword.
The bottom line for me is that Matt Gaetz has been right on the issues, but he’s been taking the wrong approach. Nothing the slim House majority does will become law in the current climate, so this is a battle for hearts and minds at this point. Rather than huge spending cuts (which almost all of us want but remain unachievable at the moment), what Gaetz and the rest of the crew should have been pushing for was defunding. That’s something the House majority can manage without the Senate or the White House. They could be focusing on slashing the funding and the paychecks of Mayorkas, Blinken, Garland, and the rest of Biden’s pack of hooligans. They might never be able to have any of them convicted and removed via impeachment because of the Senate, but they can at least hit them in the wallet and send a message.
Finally, even if they manage to vacate and take the gavel away from McCarthy, who will replace him? Who is waiting in the wings that will be more acceptable to both the Freedom Caucus and nearly every other Republican in the House, without whom there will be no Speaker? The answer is, probably nobody. So there is plenty of work to do and a limited amount of time to get it done while gearing up for the next round of elections. Perhaps it’s time to set aside the swords for a while and get down to work.
