WASHINGTON — Home Speaker Mike Johnson on Tuesday exercised his energy of the gavel — and tried to carry it down with an unusually aggressive effort to squash a proposal for brand spanking new dad and mom in Congress to capable of vote by proxy, somewhat than in particular person, as they take care of newborns.
His plan failed, 206-222.
In an unprecedented transfer, the Home Republican management had engineered a strategy to quietly kill the bipartisan plan from two new mothers — Democratic Rep. Brittany Pettersen of Colorado and Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida. Their plan has widespread assist from a majority of Home colleagues. Some 218 lawmakers backed the brand new mothers, signing on to a so-called “discharge petition” to power their proposal onto the Home ground for consideration.
However Johnson, like GOP leaders earlier than him, rails towards proxy voting, as President Donald Trump pushes folks again to work within the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic do business from home pattern.
A procedural vote Tuesday would take a look at whether or not the speaker — or the brand new mothers — have the tally on their aspect. It was turned again in dramatic vogue, with 9 Republicans becoming a member of all Democrats to sink the GOP leaders’ effort.
Pettersen with a diaper over her shoulder and 4-month-old son, Sam, in her arms, stood on the Home ground pleaded with colleagues to show again the GOP management’s effort to cease their decision.
“It’s unfathomable that in 2025 now we have not modernized Congress,” she mentioned. “We’re asking you to proceed to face with us.”
Luna, who gave delivery to her son in 2023, advised them “If we don’t do the correct factor now, it’ll by no means be completed.”
Johnson had drawn the road towards proxy voting as unconstitutional.
“Look, I’m a father, I’m pro-family. The Republican Celebration is pro-family,” the Republican speaker mentioned late final month. However he mentioned, “I imagine it violates greater than two centuries of custom and establishment. And I feel that it opens a Pandora’s field, the place in the end, possibly nobody is right here.”
It’s the primary time in fashionable Home historical past that management was taking the extraordinary step to attempt to halt a discharge petition when it’s this far alongside within the course of. Subsequent steps are unsure.
Luna used the discharge petition course of as she and others grew pissed off that Home committees and occasion management weren’t bringing the proxy-voting proposal ahead. As an alternative, she and others gathered the bulk signatures wanted, 218, to discharge it from limbo, and power it to the ground for motion.
At a Guidelines committee listening to early Tuesday, the GOP-led panel tucked in a provision into the routine guidelines course of that may have prohibited not simply this discharge petition however any others that attempt to push a proxy voting ahead.
Rep. Jim McGovern of Massachusetts, the highest Democrat on the panel, mentioned a discharge petition has by no means been halted earlier than at this stage within the course of — a outstanding transfer from Republicans who usually marketing campaign because the occasion aligned with household values.
“Given the prospect to truly assist households, they flip their backs,” he mentioned. “A majority of the chamber is upending what the bulk on this chamber desires.”
Republicans countered that Luna, who led the discharge effort, didn’t undergo the common course of, of ready for his or her decision to be dropped at the ground via the common process. And so they criticized the momentary proxy voting coverage that Democrats put in place throughout the pandemic that they mentioned was abused by member absences.
“You must come to work, you need to be current,” mentioned Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C. throughout a committee debate.
Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., the chair of the Guidelines Committee, decried what she known as the “laptop computer class” in America that doesn’t have the posh of working by proxy. “Members of Congress merely want to point out up for work,” she mentioned.
A couple of dozen ladies have given delivery whereas in Congress through the years, and there are lots of new fathers as nicely. One, Rep. Wesley Hunt, R-Texas, had dashed again to Washington for votes in 2023 after his spouse had simply given delivery and their son was in an intensive care unit.
Many new and present dad and mom had been among the many eight different Republicans who joined Luna to push forward previous leaderships.
Luna’s petition opens the door for the Home to vote on a decision that may enable new dad and mom serving in Congress to designate a proxy — one other member of Congress — to vote on their behalf for 12 weeks.
Republicans had barred proxy voting as soon as they took management of the Home from Democrats in 2023. The brand new decision, which incorporates particular procedures on how the brand new mum or dad would ship their voting directions, would imply a change of their Home guidelines.
The decision from the mothers permits {that a} proxy voting course of for lawmakers have given delivery or pregnant lawmakers who’re unable to journey safely or have a critical medical situation. It additionally applies to lawmakers whose spouses are pregnant or giving delivery.
Underneath the decision, a qualifying lawmaker might designate a proxy to solid for them for as much as 12 weeks.
Luna who’s among the many Home’s extra conservative lawmakers, made nationwide headlines for her steadfast assist of Trump. However she resigned this week from the archconservative Home Freedom Caucus this week, saying she may now not be a part of the group if members “dealer backroom offers” towards its values.
