The House Republican majority just narrowed again – and it could be about to narrow even further thanks to the House Ethics Committee
It turns out Kevin McCarthy is the quitter we all knew he was. House Republican Bill Johnson is also a quitter, even though most people didn’t even know who he was. George Santos isn’t a quitter, but he’s been fired. The House Republican majority looks like it may at least temporarily become as tiny as one vote early in the new year. Now there’s news that points to the majority potentially dropping even further – and if you’re saying that a majority can’t drop below “one” and still be a majority, you see where this is going.
When the Republican-controlled House Ethics Committee issued a report recommending Santos be expelled, it indeed prompted his expulsion. The House Ethics Committee has also reportedly been investigating Matt Gaetz for his ugly personal scandals. People like Kevin McCarthy have previously stated their expectation that the committee’s report on Gaetz will be damning and could be the end of him.
Now the committee appears to be expanding its Gaetz probe by interviewing at least one new witness. It sure sounds like House Republicans are indeed gearing up to oust Gaetz. The good news for them is that because Gaetz is in a far right district, they’d pretty much automatically get his seat back down the road in a special election. But with the House Republican majority about to drop to as little as one vote, they could temporarily lose the majority by expelling Gaetz at the wrong time.
In other words, if House Republicans really are looking to use a House Ethics Committee report to get rid of Matt Gaetz, it’ll require some finessed timing on their part – and they’re bumbling idiots. So there’s a chance they’ll blow this and end up unintentionally costing themselves the majority. Even if they time it right, you can’t account for the possibility that some other House Republican will resign or become ill while this is all going on.
So it’ll be interesting to watch how this all plays out, to put it mildly. House Republicans are looking at their majority at least temporarily becoming as small as a single vote early in the new year, at a time when they appear to be gearing up to expel one of their own, and this is all coming after they proved they couldn’t handle the Speaker position even with a five seat majority. Good luck with a more narrow one.
