Well before the
recent election, activists and pundits were hard at work shaping expectations
for what would change in light of anticipated Republican losses. Many of these predictions reflect
considerable naivete about the operations of Congress. Although many questions remain open, it seems
useful to review what we know to this point. This is the first of two posts; the second
will focus specifically on budgetary issues.
First, as to
leadership. The Senate is unlikely to
see meaningful changes at the top:
Majority Leader McConnell led his caucus to larger-than-expected
gains. Democrats’ losses seem hard to
attribute to Minority Leader Schumer, and having won his position by
acclamation just two years ago he has no obvious challenger. House Majority Leader McCarthy was easily
elected minority leader after having worked tirelessly, and reasonably
successfully, to minimize his party’s losses.
He also had the President’s support, which insulated him against the
conservative critics who denied him the speakership previously. To prevail, he only needed a majority of the
Republican Caucus.
House Democrats
are another story. Rep. Pelosi was one
of the most skilled and effective speakers of modern times; if anything, she
demonstrated even more acumen as minority leader. Her ability to force Republicans into
difficult votes while often shielding her own Members has a lot to do with
Democrats’ reconquest of the House. She
also shrewdly leveraged situations when the Republican Caucus was split to
extract substantial policy concessions from the Speakers Boehner and Ryan in
exchange for the necessary Democratic votes.
The minority leader risks blowing up a deal of this kind if she dances a
jig upon its completion, but her successes in defanging the devices Republicans
had used to leverage cuts in domestic programs – the debt limit, sequestration,
the need to adjust Medicare physicians’ reimbursement rates, etc. – merit a
full ballet.
Republicans have, however,
succeeded in making her a lightning rod and frequently tried to tie Democratic
candidates to her. Her path to the
speakership is considerably more difficult than Rep. McCarthy’s path to
becoming minority leader was because she not only needs to win a majority of
the Democratic Caucus – which she likely will secure in the next two weeks –
but also to have 218 Members vote for her to be speaker on the first day of the
new Congress. That would require several
Democrats who pledged not to vote for her to reverse their positions. She is a superb vote-counter, and if she does
not have those votes will withdraw on her own.
If she does step down, the rest of the House Democratic leadership,
which currently has regional and factional balance, may be upended. For example, if Democrats choose a more
moderate candidate for speaker, progressive members may demand that one of
their own become majority leader rather than retaining Minority Whip
Hoyer. Sorting this out could take quite
some time.
Senate Republicans
may claim that their modest gains entitle them to shift the partisan balance in
committees’ membership, presumably to create an 11-to-9 Republican advantage on
the typical committee. Democrats in
theory could filibuster the organizing resolution that sets up Senate
committees at the start of the new Congress but likely would only do so if the
Republicans overreach sufficiently that the Democrats feel confident that the
public will not blame them for obstructionism.
During the George W. Bush administration, Republicans (relying on Vice
President Cheney’s tie-breaking vote) insisted upon a one-seat advantage on all
committees when the Senate was evenly divided between the parties, and
Democrats acquiesced. In the current
situation, one can imagine negotiations leading to two-seat Republican
majorities on more powerful committees and one-seat majorities on others.
A two-seat
Republican majority still would allow Democrats to block legislation or
nominations if they can stay together and persuade one Republican. It does mean, however, that Democratic
amendments to legislation will fail in committee unless they can attract two
crossovers, which seems unlikely given the near-total disappearance of
Republican moderates. A two-seat
majority also would allow Republicans to advance legislation when one of their Senators
is ill or otherwise absent.
House committees
historically provide the majority party considerably larger margins than their
overall numbers would dictate.
Nonetheless, because of the ideological range of the caucus, some
committees may prove unreliable for the leadership’s priorities. And with relatively tenuous control of the
House and many new Members from Republican-leaning districts, Democrats cannot
even consider passing over more conservative Members who are in line to chair
committees.
Some Democratic
activists have rejoiced that Democrats will have a voice in policy for the
first time under President Trump. This
is incorrect: the threat of a filibuster
required all legislation apart from budget reconciliation bills to be
negotiated with Senate Democrats, and fractures in the House Republican Caucus often
gave House Democrats leverage on important legislation such as appropriations
and legislation raising the debt limit. Democrats’
taking over the House should, however, prevent Republicans from threatening to
resort to budget reconciliation. That,
in turn, will strengthen the hand of Senate Democrats despite their somewhat
diminished numbers by forcing all legislation to go through the regular order.
The House
Democratic leadership may have considerable difficulty controlling the
floor. Although control of the gavel and
committee supermajorities initially may succeed in bottling up problematic
legislation, Republicans amended House rules to facilitate petitions
discharging committees from the further consideration of particular bills. If a majority of representatives signs a discharge
petition for a particular bill or resolution, the leadership must bring it
before the House promptly. Republican
seem likely to exert strong pressure on vulnerable Democrats to sign discharge
petitions on politically seductive legislation, including bills to further harm
the environment and to intensify pressure for budget cuts by extending or
expanding the 2017 tax cuts.
One result of a
Democratic House majority that activists most eagerly anticipate, and that
Republicans most fear, is the ability to subpoena executive branch witnesses to
investigate what the Administration has been doing. This process is not nearly as simple as many
seem to believe.
Rule XI(m) of the
House’s standing rules allow committees and subcommittees to issue subpoenas,
either by a majority vote or through committee rules delegating the subpoena power
to the chair. One might hope that the
issuance of such a subpoena would be decisive, but the current Administration may
not be inclined to comply routinely,
The Senate has a
special statute
allowing its legal counsel to bring a civil contempt action in federal district
court to compel compliance with its subpoenas.
The House, unfortunately, lacks such a statute (and certainly is
unlikely to obtain one under this Administration).
Should an
Administration official (or anyone else) ignore a subpoena, the House may pass
a resolution asserting that that individual is in contempt of Congress and
referring her or him to the appropriate U.S. attorney for prosecution. Jefferson’s
Manual § 299 at 143-44 (2017). The
first such case against a sitting executive branch official involved EPA Administrator
Anne Gorsuch in 1982.
The President,
however, controls the Justice Department, and his appointees can decline to
take action against those ignoring House subpoenas. The President has repeatedly asserted that
the Department of Justice should act to further the current Administration’s
policy; it therefore remains to be seen whether this aspect of the Department’s
historical and
statutory
role will survive. The House
occasionally has passed resolutions authorizing the Sergeant at Arms or other
officers of the House to retain counsel to assert the interests of the House, Jefferson’s
Manual § 291b at 135 (2017), and in theory it may direct its Sergeant at
Arms to detain any recalcitrant witness.
Jefferson’s
Manual § 297, at 140 (2017). When
compared with the resources of the Administration, however, these seem rather
underpowered.
Should the Administration
both refuse to comply with a lawful subpoena and direct the Justice Department
to take no action to enforce the House’s subpoena, the House in theory could
commence impeachment proceedings against the official refusing to comply,
against the attorney general, or against the President. The minimal prospects of obtaining the
required two-thirds majority in the Senate to convict – indeed, with no
assurances that Senator McConnell would even convene an impeachment trial at
all – this is a rather limited threat.
These practical
limitations may be part of Democratic leaders’ motivation in insisting that
House committees limit and coordinate their oversight efforts. If subpoenas may only be effectively
enforceable in the court of public opinion, Democrats will want to avoid the
perception that they are overreaching.
One possible
deterrent to blatant disregard for the House’s subpoenas is the possibility
that an individual doing so could be prosecuted under the next Administration
should the President not be re-elected. Although
prosecutions under the statute
for contempt of court carry
a one-year statute of limitations, contempt of Congress is criminalized under a
separate law
and thus would appear to fall under the general
five-year federal statute of limitations.
Of course, any Administration official refusing to comply with a House
subpoena facing that prospect could hope that the President would pardon her or
him before leaving office.