Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX) has been missing votes in Washington because she’s been living in a nursing home for dementia patients for the past six months, the Daily Mail reports.
The current longest-serving GOP representative had not been on record voting for or against anything since July.
Dallas Express: Where is Kay Granger?
A Republican strategist is lashing out at Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) months after he says he fired her as a client, dubbing the far-right lawmaker a “pitiful embarrassment,” the Daily Beast reports.
Said Wesley Donehue: “I fired Nancy Mace as client a few months back because I’m a political consultant and not a babysitter, a sex therapist or a doctor who can prescribe fixes for chemical imbalances. I don’t have time for her constant egotistical bullshit and drama in my life.”
He added: “I’ve been worried about Nancy Mace for a while now. Mental health is a serious issue. I want her to get better and seek treatment.”
“The 118th Congress ended almost exactly as it began: with chaos in the House of Representatives that threatened to consume its GOP leader and shut down the government,” the Washington Post reports.
“While he avoided the ignominious event of a government shutdown, with just hours to spare, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) still faces a daunting vote at the start of the next Congress, on Jan. 3, to win a full term atop the House.”
“Johnson’s dilemma is the same one that bedeviled his predecessor, Kevin McCarthy (R-California), the always-smiling speaker who proved so ineffective he didn’t last nine months in the job. Both found themselves in a predicament in which the House GOP held a majority in principle but in practice could not come together to govern.”
“This cycle of political faceplants threatens to derail president-elect Donald Trump’s agenda, as well as Johnson’s hold on power.”
CNN: Johnson joked about his fate as speaker throughout spending negotiations.
After the week of drama around a short term spending bill, Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD) said: “I am now undecided on what House leadership should look like in the 119th Congress.”
Elon Musk is questioning whether the spending bill that Republicans are bringing to the House floor later today is a Republican bill or a Democrat bill.
“It’s real for some people, but Chip Roy can survive it. I can survive it. It’ll move the needle 20 points in a race. But if you were going to win 80-20 percent you can be okay.”
— Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), quoted by Politico, brushing off Donald Trump’s threat to back primary challengers to Republicans who defy him.
Semafor: “Republicans will now enter 2025 in a wounded state. While President Joe Biden is not exerting himself to help get a deal during his last month in office, the biggest victim of this week’s funding fight is almost surely Trump’s agenda.”
“Even before Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance followed billionaire supporter Elon Musk by delivering a last-minute blow to a bipartisan government funding deal, it was clear that Republicans’ decision to negotiate over only three months of funding would be damaging. That length of a short-term spending bill will force the GOP to juggle federal spending alongside Trump’s other priorities.”
“And no matter what length of a funding bill eventually passes, Democrats will have leverage when it expires, on funding and the debt limit. Which means this week won’t be the end of Republicans’ internal troubles, no matter how it turns out.”
Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY) spoke to C-SPAN about House GOP dysfunction over the spending bill:
MALLIOTAKIS: I don’t know what’s going on and really that’s part of problem… Zero communication from leadership to the membership. Something should change before January 3.
C-SPAN: How frustrated are you with Speaker Johnson?
MALLIOTAKIS: How does it sound?
Rep. Dan Meuser (R-PA) told Fox Business that Republicans “need to get onboard with President Trump” and added that “our role is really to be more of a supportive board of directors.”
“House Republicans are eyeing a new spending proposal that would tee up votes on three separate measures: to fund the government, appropriate disaster relief and allocate farm assistance,” The Hill reports.
“But in a shift from previous strategy — and in a break from President-elect Trump’s request — the new plan does not include a measure to increase the debt ceiling, the sources said, a move that could spark the ire of the incoming president, who demanded that such language be included.”
Punchbowl News notes the vote may need to wait until tomorrow — after the government shuts down.
Although Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) claims he’s got a “Plan C” to avert a government shutdown, Punchbowl News notes he has not filed a new bill yet today.
That means if Johnson plans to go to the House floor this morning, he has to file that soon — or perhaps he’ll go with another bill that’s already been filed.
But here’s the wrinkle: Whatever bill he puts up would be required to pass under suspension of the rules requiring a two-thirds majority since there’s not time to go to the Rules Committee.
Senate Republicans were left fuming Thursday over what they called the dysfunctional “shit show” and “fiasco” they witnessed in the House as two proposals to fund the government through Christmas failed this week, The Hill reports.
Said Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX): “I get weary with the drama associated with this. This is so dysfunctional and so distracting from the things we should be doing.”
Washington Post: “One major reason 38 Republicans opposed the bill is because of the last-minute insertion to lift the debt limit. It’s a congressional requirement that is usually necessary every couple of years, but one that no Republican likes to do and many refuse to vote for.”
“Trump had been asking Johnson to lift the debt ceiling before he takes office, two House GOP sources familiar with the request said. But one of the sources said Johnson had been reluctant because he said he doesn’t have the votes.”
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) said Republicans have arrived at a plan C to avert a shutdown and the House will vote Friday morning on the legislation, The Hill reports.
Said Johnson: “Yeah, yeah, we have a plan. We’re expecting votes this morning, so you all stay tuned. We’ve got a plan.”
It’s not clear what’s in Johnson’s plan but Donald Trump late last night reiterated that any plan must eliminate the debt ceiling threat for at last the next four years.
“It’s not a happy Friday morning for Speaker Mike Johnson. This has been an absolutely disastrous week for the speaker, President-elect Donald Trump and Republicans on Capitol Hill,” Punchbowl News reports.
“It got so bad that during a meeting with lawmakers in his office Thursday, Johnson said ‘If anyone else can get 218 votes, God bless them,’ according to three lawmakers present. Meaning they can become speaker other than him. Some in the room took it as a joke. But it seems clear Johnson is aware of his plight.”
“The federal government will shut down at midnight tonight. And the House Republican leadership — as divided, back-biting and leak-obsessed as ever — has to figure out how they’re going to keep federal employees on the job.”
“The collapse of Speaker Mike Johnson’s spending plan illustrates a painful lesson that other politicians have already learned: Absolute loyalty to Donald Trump is a one-way street,” Politico reports.
“As the U.S. teeters on the edge of a government shutdown, bitterly divided Republicans are struggling to find a way forward and Johnson’s hold on his job is in Trump’s mercurial hands.”
Washington Post: With speakership on the line, Johnson is ever more reliant on Trump.
CNN: 24 hours that exposed a schism between Trump and Johnson and sent the government hurtling toward a shutdown.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) joined a growing chorus of Democrats asserting that Elon Musk is directing Donald Trump, after the president-elect came out in opposition to a stopgap spending deal hours after his billionaire adviser heavily criticized it, the Washington Post reports.
Said Pelosi: “Elon Musk ordered his puppet President-elect and House Republicans to break the bipartisan agreement reached to keep government open. House Republicans are abdicating their responsibility to the American people and siding with billionaires and special interests.”
Daily Beast: Trump is pretty defensive about “President Elon Musk” jabs.
“I’m not just a no, I’m a hell no.”
— House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), speaking to Democrats about the new Republican government funding proposal.
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.