A bruising battle over how much spending Republicans will cut in a bill to fund the government through the rest of 2011 is earning headlines about how the GOP is in “disarray.”
But some conservatives say the battle is “healthy” and are lauding Speaker John Boehner for keeping to his promise of a more open House.
That’s partly because the right – in the form of the 87 new freshmen – won the battle, securing $100 billion in cuts in the continuing resolution.
But it’s also because the skirmish shows the newly elected members sticking to their principles in a high-profile way.
“This is exactly what we need. People who sent the freshman Republicans to Washington wanted to see that they were going to be a different kind of Republican than what we saw during the Bush years. I think this is extremely helpful to have a public fight and a back and forth,” said Americans for Tax Reform President Grover Norquist.
“It’s good optics. It’s one thing to do the right thing, it’s another for people around the country to be able to see you’re doing the right thing for the right reason. You can cleverly, behind closed doors, do the right thing and everybody goes, ‘well, I don’t know. What happened?’” Norquist said.
Influential Wall Street Journal columnist Kimberly Strassel wrote Friday about the skirmish, “To all of this Americans can sing: Hallelujah. That Republicans are having a debate over how much to cut—a lot, or even more—is a sign of how far the party has come.”
Certainly last week was painful at times for Republicans. Several unforced errors made the matters worse.
For instance, when Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor called the vote on reauthorizing the Patriot Act Tuesday, Whip Kevin McCarthy was caught off guard – he hadn’t tallied votes on the bill yet.
Freshmen were upset the legislation hadn’t received a full debate, saying they took “read the bill” rallying calls seriously.
But another reason at least some of them initially voted against it was a mistaken belief the bill only needed a simple majority vote to pass, not the two-thirds majority the bill needed since it was brought up under “suspension of the rules,” a procedure normally reserved for non-controversial matters.
The vote lost, along with one other bill that also went down and one that was pulled from a scheduled vote at the last minute to avoid a probable defeat.
Those growing pains made for a difficult week for Republican leadership, and many aides felt embattled and discouraged. Part of that feeling came from a sometimes shocking disregard by freshmen for the views of their party’s leaders.
“A lot of them seem to act as if they could give a damn who Boehner is,” said one GOP House aide. Still, the aide said “it’s actually refreshing to see people care about their campaign promises.”
Boehner remains committed to a more open House. Republicans are going forward with an open rule on the continuing resolution bill, a remarkable shift from the iron-fisted rule of former Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“The Speaker has always been committed to an open process. Sometimes that means you’re gonna lose votes. But that’s part of the way he wants to run the House,” Boehner spokesman Michael Steel said.
“He’s aware of the advantages and perceived pitfalls….so far it’s been about what he expected,” Steel said. “A more open House means it’s a battle of ideas, which is healthy and results in better legislation for the American people.”
An open rule allows unlimited amendments, meaning the GOP’s conservative flank – as well as Democratic opponents – will be able to try their best to change the substance of the bill through recorded votes.
“I think I am correct in saying that never has there been a continuing resolution that anyone can find that was brought up to the floor under a process such as this,” Cantor said a briefing with reporters Monday. “There is no limit there will be no limit to the number of amendments that Members on either side can offer.”
The floor debate is likely to be a wild ride – one veteran Republicans are bracing for. Conservatives are planning one amendment to shift $16 billion in cuts from “security” spending to further domestic spending cuts.
But for now, the chaos is somewhat according to plan. The spending cuts battle was “extremely healthy for the party,” another senior GOP aide said via e-mail, “If we want to remain a vibrant party that attracts more and more people into its ranks and keeps them there, we have to engage in robust debates on issues that matter to Joe America. Without an intellectual push-and-pull, a party becomes stale and ineffective. This debate has been a win for the GOP and for America.”