Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, has openly questioned whether the GOP deserves to keep the House majority, lamenting the lack of accomplishments this Congress. He’s not alone.
Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, has openly questioned whether the GOP deserves to keep the House majority, lamenting the lack of accomplishments this Congress. He’s not alone.
When Congress began the new year, Rep. Andy Biggs gave a television interview and made a startling confession: House Republicans have done nothing they can run on.
“We have nothing. In my opinion, we have nothing to go out there and campaign on,” the Arizona Republican said on the conservative network Newsmax. “It’s embarrassing.”
Anchor Chris Salcedo responded with a bemused chuckle. “I know,” he said. “The Republican Party in the Congress majority has zero accomplishments.”
The exchange captured a dynamic that looms over Republican lawmakers heading into the 2024 election: They’ve passed little substantive legislation since winning the majority in 2022 and struggled to do the basics of governing with a Democratic-led Senate. Their first year was instead marked by fractiousness and chaos, complicating the party’s pitch to voters this fall. The challenge is accentuated by likely GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump making “retribution” against his enemies, rather than shared policy goals, the centerpiece of his comeback bid as he continues to spread fabricated claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him.
To be fair, they do have achievements. They’re just incredibly unpopular with the general public.
The got abortion banned, they brought back child labor in some states, they blocked support for Russia’s invasion of Europe, they’re blocking bipartisan legislation on immigration so they continue to campaign on it, they got America’s
Credit rating dropped again, and they’re about to make it so federal regulators can’t keep food, water, and workplaces safe.
They were able to do a lot with their court appointments, local officials, and good old fashioned obstruction.
Yeah, this is going to be like the campaign finance rulings. Unlike Dobbs, it doesn’t have a harsh impact that people will instantly feel. It will go through, and American life will slowly get shittier, and people won’t be aware of the source.
It’ll be like slowly turning up the temperature on a frog in a pot.
They're going to get 49% of the vote at least in most races, no matter what their record is, same as Democrats. People vote for team color, not policy.
The US House banned abortion federally in the last year? The US House is about to do away with chevron deference?
This is a Republican House member complaining that their last session has mostly been embarrassing. The highest profile thing they've done is had a hard time keeping a speaker.
I was assuming the article said, "the GOP is embarrassing." It's embarrassing, Republicans - seems self evident. I mean, it's not like 10 minutes when by and they didn't get anything done. Weeks, months, years have gone by with GOP demonstrating no interest in governing; of course they haven't accomplished anything.
Which is complete bullshit, they've wreaked havoc on civil rights and eroded the fabric of society to the point of implosion, what the fuck they talking about "we done nothing", they did a LOT, and they should face trial and execution in the damned International Court once their fascist aspirations crumble.
They forced raped 10 year olds to give Birth!
They forced poor people to pay back predatory student loans!
They protected Rich CEOS who poisoned American Citizens!
They ROLLED BACK Child Labor Laws!
They banned the Bible and Dictionary!
They made Healthcare ILLEGAL!
They protected Cops who killed Kids or watched Kids DIE!
They KILLED and TRAFFICKED people!
They haven't passed a Budget!
These are EXACTLY why Republicans keep voting for them! To do EXACTLY this!
Sort of. A few districts in states where they instituted "parental oversight" laws got challenges for the bible, so it was temporarily removed from school libraries until it could go through the review process. AFAIK in every case, it was rubber-stamped instead of facing a review consistent with other challenged books.
"We just wish we could have destroyed a bigger part of society and caused additional policy disasters... Sometimes I wonder if we are really evil anymore..."
"The Republican Party is a caucus, representing many different viewpoints. Some of my colleagues wish to worsen the lives of poor people. Others prefer to focus on worsening the lives of minorities. Still others prioritize their personal financial well-being. With this diversity of opinions, it can be hard to find common ground."
Guess they can't really brag about where they actually focus energy: stonewalling any and all progress and poisoning the public's opinion and trust of "the Other", whatever the target may be.
Bragging about accomplishments and compromise is the old way to campaign.
The modern form of getting elected is not to actually do anything. Because if you solve a problem then you can't scare your voters with that problem in the future.
An example of this is abortion. Conservatives could always count on the one issue, "pro-life" voter to give them their vote to ban abortion. Now that it's become easier for states to restrict abortion there is less incentive for these one issue voters to come out to the polls.
I fear that the left is starting to see the effectiveness of the "scare the voter" strategy and will drag their feet on certain hot topic issues like abortion so they can get more votes.
On the talks with the social media companies didn't they make sure government couldn't interfere? They delayed the promotion of the military officers over abortion
They can't go on indefinitely. It works because they attack each other in purity contests; the fight over speakers (twice) was one major front in this. Eventually, you run out of people to purify and need to invent a whole new issue. If you don't, your support evaporates as people look for actual solutions to their problems.
There's a strategy here that I don't think has been fully utilized. If you can get the right to speedrun their purity contests against each other, you might be able to watch them eat each other quietly in a corner rather than dragging the whole country into fascism.
And for some reason the bit about Trump running on revenge is put as a negative... Newsmax/Fox brainwashed magas live for vengeance, they LOVE Trump because he's a vehicle to attack people they don't like.
The GOP is stuck in the "good" old ways of thinking about selling themselves to the population via the things they've done. Trump just says "elect me and help you kill liberals."
Don't feel bad champ, you held the second most votes for Speaker of the House, that's almost a record, you took the most basic part of your job, something that has been done 129 times, and only taken more than 1 vote 16 times (once since the civil war) and turned it into an international embarrassment, twice, in January it took 15 rounds to select McCarthy, then 10 months into the 2 year term you did it again!