House Republicans are at odds, debating the idea of ousting Johnson

While this year has proven to be a tumultuous time in Congress, House Republicans find themselves face to face with yet another chaotic showdown this week as the conference fractures over foreign aid and a possible motion to vacate House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA).

The release of Johnson’s four-pronged foreign aid plan combined with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s (R-GA) motion to vacate has tensions running high on Capitol Hill, resulting in louder and more public displays of infighting as the House GOP seeks a path forward without relying on Democrats to bail them out.

The Republican conference has been plagued by months of discourse, but it’s come to a head over the last few weeks during battles over the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and now the foreign aid legislation to Ukraine, Israel, and other nations.

House Freedom Caucus members and their hard-right allies are on one side of the battle, calling on Johnson to call Democrats’ bluff and force them to move on border security. Members who typically get along with the hard-line caucus are reaching their limit, accusing their colleagues of caring more about fundraising and social media hits than governing.

Emotions ran high on Thursday when Reps. Derrick Van Orden (R-WI) and Matt Gaetz (R-FL) got into a heated argument on the House floor that resulted in name-calling. Several members confirmed to the Washington Examiner that Johnson was meeting with House Freedom Caucus members and other hard-line GOP members, including Gaetz, when Van Orden came up to the group.

Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN), who is not a member of the Freedom Caucus, told reporters that Johnson and the initial group of members were not discussing a motion to vacate the chair and instead were talking about policy decisions on Ukraine and Israel.

“Byron [Donalds] and Matt [Gaetz] were making perfectly good sense, and then someone came in later and blew it up,” Burchett said.

“It’s just, people are frustrated and tired, and they’re wanting — you know, we’re conservative — and nobody in that group, the original group, until the latecomer came in, said anything about vacating the chair,” Burchett added. “That wasn’t, you know, it wasn’t really the conversation.”

That “someone” turned out to be Van Orden, who said in an interview with the Washington Examiner that he saw Johnson having a “vigorous debate” with members and went over to defend Johnson.

“And Navy SEALS, and which I am a retired one, we never go anywhere without a swim buddy. And the speaker of the House didn’t have a swim buddy,” Van Orden said.

He added that though he has deep respect for several of the House Freedom Caucus members present at the discussion — such as Reps. Byron Donalds (R-FL), Clay Higgins (R-LA), and Eli Crane (R-AZ) — he did not believe Gaetz was speaking to Johnson in a way that “comported with decorum.”

During the exchange between Van Orden and Gaetz, the Florida congressman called Van Orden a “squish”, prompting the Wisconsin Republican to respond with, “Kick rocks, tubby.”

“And this is why: You have to push back at bullies. Matt Gaetz is a bully. Chip Roy is a bully. Bob Good is a bully. And we can’t govern with bullies,” Van Orden said. “We can’t allow bullies to hold the sword of Damocles over the speaker of the House.”

Following the incident, Gaetz spoke to reporters outside the Capitol, saying Van Orden had been pushing for a motion to vacate and filing it in a privileged way. A spokesperson with Van Orden’s office told the Washington Examiner that Van Orden told a few of the members to stop with the threats of a motion to vacate and that they should either “file it or shut up about it.”

“The only thing I gleaned from it is that Mr. Van Orden is not a particularly intelligent individual,” Gaetz said of the conversation.

Foreign aid legislation rule spells ousting for Johnson

While Gaetz and Van Orden were arguing on the chamber floor, the House Rules Committee convened to deliberate over how to advance a procedural vote on the foreign aid bills to the floor, particularly after three hard-line conservatives threatened to vote “no” on the rule.

Reps. Ralph Norman (R-SC), Thomas Massie (R-KY), and Chip Roy (R-TX) almost immediately came out in opposition to Johnson’s bill and met with him on Wednesday to voice concerns.

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY), a vulnerable House Republican, called on the three members to resign from the Rules Committee or be removed by the speaker. Van Orden also agreed they should be removed, adding that he circulated a rule last night detailing that if a GOP member votes against a rule, they should be stripped of all committee assignments.

Others have come out against the Republicans looking to hold up the rule vote, arguing it goes against the goals of the party to “decentralize the power.”

“What’s not being fair is when we’re constantly taking down the rule, that’s showing that your vote is more important,” House Republican Conference Vice Chairman Blake Moore (R-UT) said on Thursday. “Your 750,000 people in X district is more important than the 750,000 people that live in the first district of Utah. That’s the part that’s fundamentally unfair.”

Another source of infighting comes from the idea that Johnson may rely on Democratic votes to pass the rule vote and pass the legislation. Rep. Bob Good (R-VA) said on Thursday that Johnson continues to “diminish and weaken himself” by passing legislation with predominantly Democratic votes.

“That’s going to happen: We’re going to vote against the rule, he’s going to have as many Democrats as he needs baked into the cake to support the rule, I suspect, and that’s bad for the American people,” Good told reporters.

Van Orden, however, disagreed.

“On a calendar, put your finger on the date when bipartisanship became bad. When did bipartisanship become bad? When? I don’t think it has,” Van Orden said. “So let’s quit pretending like if some Democrats come to their senses and vote for some of our bills, then let’s quit pretending like it’s a bad thing.”

Meanwhile, there’s a growing number of House Republicans who are pursuing a rules change to increase the threshold required to vacate a speaker, which is being led by Rep. Dusty Johnson (R-SD). At least a dozen lawmakers have expressed support for that change, a source familiar told the Washington Examiner.

“Again, we’ve got a small group of people who are upset that they’re not getting their way. It’s the era of divided government. Nobody gets everything they want,” Dusty Johnson said in a video. “They want to throw out the current speaker of the House. It’s a terrible idea. I’m working with a group of members to change the rules so they can’t get that done. So that one knucklehead can’t put the whole House into disarray by forcing another speaker vote.”

The details of such a rule change are not yet clear. Under current House rules, any one member can file a motion to vacate and force a vote on whether to oust the speaker. That rule was agreed to by former Speaker Kevin McCarthy in order to garner enough support to secure the gavel himself — before being ousted just nine months later.

At least two House Republicans have come out publicly to support Dusty Johnson’s proposal, arguing the one-member threshold has weakened the GOP majority.

“When the Dems had the majority, their ‘motion to vacate’ the Speaker rule required the majority of the majority, which was 124 sponsors,” Bacon said in a post on X. “In Jan 2023, we changed the rule to require only one sponsor. This has weakened our majority and Congress as a whole. It is time to fix.”

Van Orden said he “absolutely” supports changing the threshold and has been involved in those conversations with other members.

“It was a terrible tactical error to agree to lowering that threshold to one,” the Wisconsin Republican said. “The reason being that gave anybody the ability to exercise coercion over the speaker of the House. And that is not how you govern, and that never should have passed.”

He added that he’s “not surprised” Democrats want to raise the threshold and that he is tired of a small coalition of conservatives being “destructors” and not “disruptors.”

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“There’s a difference between a disrupter and a destructor. We need disruption around here; we need to shake the tree. But we don’t need to burn the tree down or cut it down,” Van Orden said. “And that’s what a select few members of the Freedom Caucus have been doing.”

“It’s time to shake this tree, and you know who needs to fall out of it? A couple members of the Freedom Caucus,” the congressman added.