On Friday, 21 House Republicans voted against a short-term government funding bill proposed by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), marking the latest defeat for the speaker in the ongoing feud between himself and the Republican party’s conservative wing.
A government shutdown seems unavoidable now that the bill has been rejected, with McCarthy still pressing attempts to keep the government running before current funding runs out this weekend, even though the bill was expected to fail in the Democrat-controlled Senate.
The 21 Republicans who held out against the bill were Andy Biggs (R-AZ), Dan Bishop (R-NC), Lauren Boebert (R-CO), Ken Buck (R-CO), Tim Burchett (R-TN), Eric Burlison (R-MO), Michael Cloud (R-TX), Eli Crane (R-AZ), Matt Gaetz (R-FL), Paul Gosar (R-AZ), Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), Wesley Hunt (R-TX), Nancy Mace (R-SC), Mary Miller (R-IL), Cory Mills (R-FL), Alex Mooney (R-WV), Barry Moore (R-AL), Troy Nehls (R-TX), Andy Ogles (R-TN), Matt Rosendale (R-MT) and Keith Self (R-TX).
Many, but not all, of these representatives belong to the House Freedom Caucus, a group which has utilized the slim Republican majority in the House to advance their own agenda, often against the wishes of McCarthy, and has frequently clashed with other Republicans and Democrats alike.
Several of the opposing voices also released statements in the time preceding the vote, such as Rep. Cloud who called attempts at a continuing resolution part of “political games” in a statement released immediately before the vote took place.
“We have known this day was coming. Yet here we are in late September, with some in leadership using shutdown politics as a mean of pushing a Continuing Resolution,” he said. “While such political games may have been successful in the past, it will not work this time. We have to keep our word. It is time to do what we said we would do.”
Others, such as Rep. Biggs, went further, arguing against the use of any continuing resolutions or short-term funding bills, writing an op-ed for the Daily Caller published before the vote on Friday.
“Because House Republicans did not timely produce a budget as required by law, ‘they,’ the leaders of the Uniparty, began championing their preferred budget mechanism, the CR. CRs have only made the American economy worse off,” he said on X, posting a link to the article.
Rep. Buck called out GOP leadership in an interview on CNN the night prior, arguing that the budget should have been solved long ago.
“For this entire year, House Republicans leadership has known about the September 30 budget deadline. There is no reason why we couldn’t have a fully funded government by now. The American people are rightly frustrated,” he said on X.
Rep. Miller argued that if the budget was not solved now, then it would be kicked “down the road until the holidays, when Senate and House ‘insiders’ will agree to ram through some massive omnibus with Ukraine funding behind closed doors,” she posted on X.
Rep. Moore echoed these calls, arguing that he and other representatives needed to work overtime to get a full budget passed rather than a short-term measure.
“It has been 26 years since Congress passed all 12 appropriations bills. In order to impact policy and cut spending, we need to follow the statute and reject the status quo,” he said on X. “I am committed to staying in Washington as long as it takes and working with my colleagues across the conference to advance the 12 appropriations bills that curtail our out-of-control spending and help American families fight Biden’s 17 percent inflation tax.”
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