BURSTHouse Democrats are going after Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) over the Republican leadership effort to sink legislation allowing proxy voting for lawmakers on parental leave, even after the bill won the support of the majority of the lower chamber.
Johnson and his leadership team are attempting to kill the bill on Tuesday by concocting a rule that would block the legislation from hitting the floor even after it won 218 signatures on a procedural gambit, known as a discharge petition, that forces bills to the floor with a simple majority support.
The Democratic critics say Johnson is not only defying House rules, he’s undermining the will of voters who sent lawmakers to Congress to speak on their behalf.
“Republicans are flouting democracy,” Rep. Judy Chu (D-Calif.) said Tuesday.
“They’re going to do any kind of mechanism they can to get their way,” echoed Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.). “I resent it a lot.”
Sponsored by Rep. Brittany Pettersen (D-Colo.), the legislation would empower lawmakers on parental leave to vote remotely. A more universal proxy voting system had been installed in the early stages of the Covid pandemic, but it was widely panned by conservatives who said it was unconstitutional.
Johnson has amplified those criticisms amid the current debate over Pettersen’s bill, saying it would lead to a slippery slope of mass remote voting.
To get around that blockade in the top ranks, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) launched a discharge petition that won the 218 signatures needed to force a floor vote.
But at Johnson’s request, the GOP-led Rules Committee drafted a rule that not only blocks the bill from receiving a vote, it also prevents lawmakers from using a discharge petition to advance proxy voting for the remainder of the 119th Congress.
Heading into the vote, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) was confident the rule will be successful.
“We’re going to pass the rule,” Scalise said.
The move has infuriated Luna, who dropped out of the House Freedom Caucus on Monday to protest the group’s opposition to the bill — a position that’s raised eyebrows since a number of the group’s members had voted by proxy during the pandemic.
Democrats are piling on. They’re planning to oppose the rule, hoping there are enough GOP lawmakers in Luna’s camp to help them kill it when it hits the floor Tuesday afternoon.
“We have a clear majority in the House for Anna Luna’s proposal to allow pregnant women to vote by proxy,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin (Md.), senior Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee.
“We got a majority and the majority should be able to rule.”