Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) reacts on the day U.S. President Donald Trump meets with top congressional leaders from both parties, just ahead of a September 30 deadline to fund the government and avoid a shutdown (REUTERS)
Punchbowl News Co-founder Jake Sherman says the Republican-led House of Representatives has been effectively derailed ever since the government shutdown and has been unable to right itself enough to pass the simplest legislation.
“At this moment, House Republicans are on the floor about to lose another vote, a key vote that would allow them to bring a series of bills to the floor of limited interest to most people on planet Earth, but of intense interest to me,” Sherman told MS NOW host Katy Tur. “They are losing a bill that would allow them to bring up a permitting reform bill. This House Republican conference ... is just an unmitigated disaster."
Passing the resolution would allow the chamber to consider several other environment-related bills, including a bill to amend the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 to remove the gray wolf from the list of endangered and threatened wildlife under the Endangered Species Act and another bill that would allow Trump regulators to halt the decommissioning of ageing power plants, including older technology plants that cause more pollution or burn inefficiently.
Democrats oppose the resolution, but Republicans are apparently unable to muster the votes in their majority to steamroll the minority party.
“I mean, it's just — we see right here with 206-to-210 [vote], six Republicans voting against the resolution. They cannot get anything done,” Sherman said. “On health care, they have a bill on the floor this week that's just a bunch of warmed-over Republican health care policies that they've already passed. Moderate Republicans, the majority makers, katy, the people that made Mike Johnson the speaker, and before that, Kevin McCarthy, the speaker. They want to vote on extending these premium subsidies for Obamacare — the same thing we've been talking about for 5 or 6 months.”
Sherman said Speaker Johnson is not allowing the Obamacare vote to happen becasue he wants them offset with other budget cuts and has “concerns about pro-life provisions in these subsidies.”
“And the moderates are just furious with him,” Sherman said. “But, the entire conference is getting pretty tired of this. I mean, ever since the shutdown, and frankly, ever since July, they have not been able to get their act together. And we're seeing that again right now. It's just a complete, unmitigated disaster for speaker Mike Johnson.”