Swing district Republicans are definitely panic-stricken. Voters are not happy with the dysfunction and the impending all-GOP government shutdown. It’s not like they’re negotiating with the Democrats; they’re negotiating with themselves. Conservative Republicans like Mike Lawler (NY), who’s facing an existential threat from Mondaire Jones, the popular Democrats who represented most of his district, is publicly talking about how “crazy” his colleagues are and starting to work with Democrats to prevent a shutdown. He told the media that “This is not conservative Republicanism. This is stupidity... It’s a clown show. You keep running lunatics. You’re going to be in this position.” He was talking about his Republican colleagues, not about Democrats.
On Wednesday night, Matt Gaetz told a closed door GOP meeting that McCarthy could never pass a CR— even after McCarthy caved on EVERY SINGLE policy demand the extremists wanted. McCarthy responded to Gaetz on Thursday morning by whining to the press that “This is a whole new concept of individuals that just want to burn the whole place down. That doesn’t work.”
Late yesterday, John McCollister, a prominent Nebraska Republican ex-state Senator tweeted “Distressed by House Republicans shutting down the government? If so, you have the Republican party to blame. It’s not just the crazies— blame the fake moderates that put the wackos in power. Reap what you sow.” That is what swing voters all over the country are seeing. Trump and his acolytes pushing to cause chaos and more dysfunction by shutting down the government is freaking out Republicans who have to face the voters next year, not in deep red districts where moderates and independents don’t matter, but in districts where they do. Take Montana, for example. There are two districts and each elected a Republican— neo-fascist Matt Rosendale in the eastern district (PVI R+16) and mainstream conservative Ryan Zinke in the western district (R+6). The Democrats are targeting Zinke’s district, already spending money there to connect him to the defective House GOP. Rosendale, who has played an active role in undermining McCarthy and moving down the road to a shutdown, is going to run for the U.S. Senate next year, something Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT) is thrilled about and Mitch McConnell is horrified by. Zinke has done all he can to distance himself from Rosendale and even endorsed his very flawed, corrupt primary opponent.
Some Senate Republicans are encouraging McCarthy to give up on the “Freedom” Caucus and start working with the Democrats. Yesterday, McCarthy sent his conference home a day and a half early and cancelling weekend votes that had been expected in what’s turning into a shutdown emergency 8 days away. Alexander Bolton reported that “GOP senators don’t think McCarthy will be able to unify his entire GOP conference behind any measure to prevent an Oct. 1 shutdown and will have to rely on Democrats to keep federal departments and agencies open. But they predict the Speaker won’t reach out across the aisle until the last possible moment to avoid a backlash from House conservatives, who are threatening to offer a motion to essentially dump him as Speaker if he does not hew to their demands for major spending cuts. The reality, they say, is that the only spending measure that can pass both the Senate and House is one that has bipartisan support.”
The problem for McCarthy is that Gaetz has already drawn up the vacate the chair resolution and he’ll introduce it the moment McCarthy does anything remotely bipartisan and— unless the Democrats agree to keep McCarthy on as speaker (unheard of)— Gaetz will win hands down. It’s a real shit show, especially for a craven politician like McCarthy who has been willing to prostrate himself before Trump and then over and over again before the “Freedom” Caucus extremists. He’s given them everything them want but his own head on a platter.
“He’s a new Speaker; this is a test of his Speakership,” said one Republican senator who requested anonymity to discuss party strategy. “Sooner or later he’s going to have to go to Hakeem Jeffries because we’re going to get a CR on this side and what will pass here just is not going to get 218 Republicans in the House.”
After House Republicans scrapped a Tuesday vote because of divisions within their conference, Republican senators said they now expect the Senate to move first and approve a clean continuing resolution (CR).
The measure would have to pass with at least 60 votes in the Senate and then be sent to the House to avoid a government shutdown.
Under such a scenario, McCarthy would certainly need Democratic votes to make up for a small group of conservatives who have vowed to oppose any spending bill without steep spending cuts or reforms to U.S. asylum law or Department of Justice and Pentagon policies.
“The ultimate outcome will be 218 Republicans and Democrats [who] will pass something that doesn’t have conservative leaning to it,” Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) said.
Sen. Jery Moran (R-KS), a [hard right] member of the Appropriations Committee, voiced concern about the looming government funding deadline.
“I hope they have a plan,” he said. “I have no idea how they get to where they need to go but they need to get there.”
Other Republican senators voiced frustration over McCarthy’s inability to pass a procedural rule necessary to approve the annual defense appropriations bill, legislation that has always been a signature achievement for the party that traditionally prides itself for being strong on defense.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) called the failure to advance the defense bill “very disappointing.”
“I’m going to leave it up to him,” Graham said of McCarthy, adding, “The world is a very dangerous place, and we need to get our national defense infrastructure well funded to deter aggression.
“The defense appropriation bill is sort of the heart and soul of the Republican Party that I’ve come to know and love, and it’s unnerving to see the defense appropriations bill not able to advance,” Graham said.
The defense bill stalled in the House Tuesday after five conservatives joined Democrats to defeat the rule that was needed to pass the $826 billion measure.
Republican senators are losing patience with McCarthy’s efforts to coax Republican colleagues to support the bills needed to keep the government open and fund the Pentagon and other priorities.
“I think we’ve got some folks that wear our label as Republicans that are really more populist than Republican, and at this stage of the game we’ve been relying on those folks to come around and work on some of these more conservative issues with us, like actually passing a budget, actually passing an appropriations bill, actually passing a defense bill. Clearly this is not of interest to them,” Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD) said of House conservatives who have derailed McCarthy’s efforts.
Rounds said it may be time for McCarthy to explore “other options,” such as finding votes on the other side of the aisle.
“If there are other options out there— I think there are reasonable people on the other side of the aisle as well,” he said. “That might be the way to let these populists know that they might put themselves in a position of not being very effective in the future.
“If you’re not going to be part of a solution, pretty soon people are talking to other individuals,” he said.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) said the demands of the House Freedom Caucus, such as cutting discretionary spending levels outside the departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs by 8 percent, are unrealistic.
“They know it won’t fly over here,” she said, noting the deep spending cuts that House conservatives are insisting on won’t get the 60 votes needed to pass the Senate.
“It’s their message, and the problem is we need more than messages to keep the government open,” she said. “If it’s clear that the House is not going to be able to advance [spending bills], we’re going to have to figure out what exactly is [the Senate’s] role” to avoid a shutdown.
Another Republican senator who requested anonymity to discuss McCarthy’s inability to pass spending bills suggested that conservative rebels are taking unfair shots at the Speaker to undermine his leadership.
“It’s really hard when you have snipers on your own team shooting at you from inside the perimeter,” the senator said.
The growing exasperation Senate Republicans expressed over the intraparty fighting in the House is shared by House GOP lawmakers.
“These five or 10 people, they failed us. And I’ll say that publicly,” [mainstream conservative] Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE) told The Hill Wednesday morning. “They failed us; they failed the conservative cause.”
“They’re gonna push us in the minority unless we intervene,” he added.
There are 9 Republicans led by Matt “I’m a never CR” Gaetz who say— and probably another 9 or more who don’t say— they will never under any circumstances vote for a CR to keep the government open. That means McCarthy either works with the Democrats— even at the cost of his gavel— or the government shuts down, which would probably cost the Republicans at least 2 dozen House seats, perhaps a couple of Senate seats and whatever chance they have to win in Virginia in just over a month. Eli Crane, a neo-fascist from Arizona in a deep red district said “It’s the new CR; we put a bow on it and given it a new name. I mean, it’s the same old nonsense in this town— no, no, no. Not doing it.”