As Speaker Mike Johnson and his group have navigated the House’s slimmest margin since earlier than World War II, they’ve seen all of it.
Once, Republicans have been headed for a second, embarrassing failed try to impeach then-President Joe Biden’s Homeland Security chief due to inside disputes — until they may spherical up yet one more GOP vote. They phoned up a Republican who was resting at residence with a coronary heart situation, whose physician had warned towards flying to Washington. The member flew anyway.
Another time, a Republican member was in Washington when he realized of his mom’s demise. GOP leaders had to ask him to stick round for a few extra hours or they’d fail a vote. He stayed.
And simply final month, dozens of House Republicans attended a White House coal trade occasion however couldn’t get again to the US Capitol for a vote as a result of protests — together with throngs of Buddhist monks — had closed the streets. The GOP management group frantically phoned members telling them to ditch their rides and hoof it to the Metro.
House Republicans reside in a fixed battle to preserve management of their chamber as evidenced by such cases, which have been described by a number of members and aides in GOP management.
With the slimmest margins for the reason that Thirties, Johnson can afford to lose solely a single vote on the House flooring. It’s a very tough activity on this fractious GOP convention, with a handful of hardliners keen to defy the occasion — and even President Donald Trump — on key points. GOP leaders should additionally navigate calls for from battleground members anxious to survive the midterms, plus dozens extra Republicans with their very own priorities operating statewide campaigns.
And whereas the House is unlikely to move main laws within the coming months, Trump and GOP leaders are nonetheless keen to use Congress to present their priorities forward of November’s elections — requiring the occasion to be in lockstep.
House Majority Whip Tom Emmer recalled a dialog in latest days with a Republican threatening to help a Democrat-backed decision as a result of, as they informed him, “no one’s listening to me and my district is going to be a problem.”
Emmer supplied a terse reply: “If you do this, it ain’t your district that’s going to be a problem.”
It might quickly get tougher for Johnson.
If he loses even yet one more seat, Republicans acknowledge it might turn into nearly not possible to govern the chamber.
One of their members, Texas Rep. Tony Gonzales, is going through calls to resign his seat after admitting to an affair with a staffer who later died by suicide.
GOP leaders are additionally intently monitoring the well being of Rep. Neal Dunn of Florida, who some concern might have to depart his seat early for well being causes, a number of Republicans informed NCS.
And there’s personal concern amongst management that their members who lose statewide bids, similar to Rep. Wesley Hunt of Texas, might threaten to cease displaying up altogether, a number of sources informed NCS.
The margins depart zero room for error — and that’s assuming each member is current, which isn’t assured with 218 Republicans from all corners of America. It’s an endeavor that usually requires minute-by-minute monitoring, with an intricate data of members’ moods and calendars.
“We have to watch every single flight to make sure every single member gets on that flight,” one particular person in GOP management informed NCS.
Sometimes, it requires significantly painful conversations, similar to asking members to return to Washington whereas nonetheless grieving losses of their spouses or youngsters. Many members cite Rep. Steve Womack, a revered senior Republican, who misplaced his spouse of 41 years in January and returned to vote days later — earlier than the household held a burial — to oversee his spending invoice on the ground. Others have had to battle via their very own well being challenges, together with House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, who was actively voting throughout a lot of his remedy for blood most cancers a few years in the past.
“I think those are some of the most difficult conversations we have to have,” one other particular person concerned within the GOP vote-counting operation stated.
With each vote tight, any Republican threatening to defect can now get an viewers with GOP leaders — and generally Trump. Rep. John Rose of Tennessee lately vowed to tank a occasion precedence as he sought to get a increase from the president in his governor’s race, as NCS reported.
“I love it. I’m getting everything I want,” quipped Rep. Andrew Garbarino of New York, a management ally, of the eye.
Sometimes, the convention’s most recalcitrant members have merely refused to inform management how they plan to vote, forcing Johnson and his group to gamble.
Emmer recalled a time throughout appropriations season when he huddled on the ground with Scalise and their whip groups deciding whether or not to name sure members’ bluffs and maintain a vote. When Scalise requested aloud what the group wished to do, Emmer pretended to throw a handful of cube. They went forward with the vote and gained.
“There are people who understand what real leverage is. And there are people who think they’re leveraging that have nothing to leverage,” Emmer stated.
It additionally requires powerful selections from GOP leaders. Johnson has wanted to bar his personal members from promotions inside the Trump administration and quash members’ goals of Senate appointments, similar to maintaining them out of the operating to backfill Marco Rubio Florida’s seat final yr, in accordance to a number of GOP management aides.
Sometimes there merely aren’t sufficient members to maintain votes. Weeks in the past, House Republicans have been pressured to pull a private Trump precedence — a invoice to enhance bathe stress ranges — from the schedule as a result of they didn’t have sufficient “bodies on the floor” to defeat a Democratic procedural vote, as one GOP aide put it. Last week alone, GOP leaders canceled two days of votes due to attendance.
The GOP management workers have turn into fluent within the sparse flight schedules of tiny rural airports, in addition to the can’t-miss marketing campaign occasions for dozens of House members who’re making an attempt to steadiness statewide races again residence. Other instances it’s the climate that complicates issues. Last July, as House GOP leaders ready for ultimate passage of Trump’s sweeping home coverage invoice, GOP leaders watched flight after flight get canceled. With flight-tracker apps pulled up on their computer systems, the management group phoned members from all around the nation, telling them to get in a rental automobile and drive.
“You’re trying to see when you can put a vote on the floor based on weather — I mean, based on the weather!” Rep. Kevin Hern, a member of Johnson’s management group, exclaimed to NCS. “It makes it very difficult, because you don’t get along with your family, obviously, all the time, and we are family.”
Earlier this yr, Johnson recalled telling his members — and never in jest — “take your vitamins” and keep away from “adventure sports” as a result of he couldn’t afford anybody coming down with illness or harm.
Some issues, although, can’t be prevented. Rep. James Baird of Indiana returned to Washington in a neck brace after he and his spouse have been in a critical automobile accident. His spouse later died following issues from her accidents. (Baird’s accident in January was a jolt to GOP members: It occurred across the similar time because the sudden loss of their longtime colleague Rep. Doug LaMalfa of California.)
And there are lots extra well being scares that go unreported.
“One of our colleagues, I’m not going to tell you who, literally came here to vote and then went back to the hospital,” Rep. David Joyce of Ohio stated, including that members really feel the burden of their obligations. “Your duty is here. You got elected to do your job here.”
Matters of ‘life and death’
Until latest years, House members have been free to sometimes miss votes for extra routine life occasions again residence, similar to a child’s large sporting occasion or a grandchild’s wedding ceremony. For many of the trendy period, occasion leaders have had giant sufficient margins that attendance was not a difficulty. They might even afford for members to resign mid-term.
Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska, one among this Congress’ retiring members, stated he’s been requested why he’s bothering to stick round for the remainder of the yr when there’s nearly no probability of massive laws going via.
“People say, ‘Why don’t you just resign now?’” Bacon recalled, however he famous he’s been agency: “I wouldn’t do that to my district” — or, he added, to Johnson.
Democratic Rep. Steny Hoyer spent a long time in management, together with when the occasion in cost had a majority of fifty votes. But through the years, the nation’s bitter partisanship and redistricting gambits have shrunk these margins dramatically. By the time Biden and Hill Democrats had full management of Washington in 2021, they have been down to single digits.
“We had four. That’s a landslide compared to what he’s got now,” Hoyer stated of Johnson. (Republicans like to level out that Democrats additionally used pandemic-era proxy voting throughout that point, which made attendance far much less of a downside.)
GOP leaders repeatedly warn that solely issues of “life and death” ought to forestall members from attending votes. That consists of even noncontroversial votes as a result of Republicans can’t danger shedding a procedural vote to Democrats. If they did, that will successfully cede management of the ground to the minority occasion.
“If we’re in the majority for a day, there are plenty of ways that we could make their lives very annoyingly difficult,” one House Democratic aide stated. “We could make a lot of mischief.”
The whip group takes attendance so significantly that after they discover out any member should miss votes, it’s handled as categorized data — lest Democrats discover out.
Members, too, take the mandate significantly.
Rep. Kat Cammack of Florida has not missed a single vote since she gave start to her daughter final August. (She didn’t time it that method, however acknowledges it labored out as a result of members should not have maternity depart.)
“Two weeks after I gave birth, I put my daughter on a train, because I didn’t want to fly with her. That was a 16-hour train ride. She’s been on dozens of flights. She goes back and forth with me. We make it work,” Cammack stated.
Democrats know that their attendance in Washington is one among their strongest instruments from their perch within the minority.
Rep. Brittany Pettersen flew along with her new child son nearly instantly after giving start in January 2025. The Colorado Democrat campaigned for remote voting privileges for new parents — however GOP leaders opposed it and finally blocked the trouble.
The yr earlier than, Democrats’ excellent attendance helped tank the GOP’s first try to impeach Biden’s Homeland Security secretary, Alejandro Mayorkas — dealing a humiliating defeat to Johnson and Trump.
Republicans went forward with the vote regardless of key defections on their aspect, playing that Democrats can be down a member, since Rep. Al Green of Texas had been out all week for stomach surgical procedure. But within the ultimate moments, Green emerged on the ground in hospital garb and a wheelchair to defeat the measure.
Emmer will always remember which Republicans voted towards the occasion that day — together with then-Wisconsin Rep. Mike Gallagher, who led a coveted China panel on the time.
The GOP whip added that he generally wished occasion leaders had performed hardball with Gallagher, recalling what he would have liked to say to him on the time: “Look, I love you Mike, but if I don’t have you on this one, maybe this China subcommittee — maybe someone else has to do it.”