Congress

GOP leaders scramble to squelch vote on parental proxy voting

Published

1 year ago

March 27, 2025

House GOP leaders are racing to head off a vote being pushed by one of their own members on a measure that would allow lawmakers who are new parents to vote by proxy.

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) has already gathered enough member signatures on a discharge petition to force a vote. But Speaker Mike Johnson, who argues that proxy voting is unconstitutional, is considering several options to prevent it from happening as Luna mulls the way forward.

They include trying to kill the discharge petition in the Rules Committee next week, according to three people with direct knowledge of the matter who, like others quoted in this story, were granted anonymity to discuss private talks. Some hard-liners are also floating a more drastic option: changing the House rules to effectively block future discharge petitions this Congress by making the process to trigger a fast-track floor vote much more burdensome, the three people said.

“There aren’t many good options here,” said one GOP lawmaker.

Right now, GOP leaders appear focused on trying to peel away some of the 11 Republicans who joined Luna in signing the discharge petition. Majority Leader Steve Scalise, Whip Tom Emmer and others have aggressively whipped members against the effort, according to three GOP lawmakers who have spoken with them.

Luna said Thursday she has been lobbied heavily herself by House Republican leaders to abandon her effort, which would allow for 12 weeks of proxy voting for new parents. She said they offered to bring her bill to the Rules Committee if she would agree to drop the discharge petition, but Luna has so far rejected that deal. She said she heard Republicans on the panel would block it from the floor.

”If you’re going to negotiate, you’re not going to be honest with the negotiations, there is no negotiation,” she said, later adding, “I am not going to destroy democracy by allowing female members to vote when recovering from birth.”

Luna said leaders are also threatening members who are backing her, telling them their bills will not come to the floor and that the party won’t be “helping with fundraising.” She said she was also offered committee assignments she had previously been denied as an enticement to end her proxy-voting push.

One Republican who joined Luna in the discharge effort, Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee, said “somebody” offered to bring a bill he sponsored to the floor in exchange for switching his vote.

“Voting against pregnant women, are y’all crazy?” Burchett said he responded.

A spokesperson for Johnson didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the strong-arm allegations.

Under House rules, Luna’s measure can be called up as privileged business seven legislative days after the completion of the discharge petition. That would tee up the effort for action early next week unless GOP leaders can find an off-ramp.

They aren’t at this point openly pursuing a permanent rules change, something that could invite a slew of other member demands for rules tweaks. One option Johnson and his leadership circle had been considering — changing House rules to make discharge petitions subject to a two-thirds majority rather than the current 218 signatures — is no longer considered likely after at least one Rules Committee Republican warned they wouldn’t support raising the threshold, according to two people with direct knowledge who were granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter.

Instead, hard-liners are floating other rules changes that would make it significantly harder to call up a discharged measure as privileged business, allowing for a fast-track vote.

Most Republicans are vehemently opposed to allowing proxy voting, which was widely used under Speaker Nancy Pelosi during the Covid pandemic from 2020 through 2023, when the GOP took back control of the chamber and abolished it.

“The speaker needs to kill it,” said Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.), a Freedom Caucus member who also sits on the Rules Committee.

Luna said the position of Norman, Johnson and other GOP opponents of proxy voting is at odds with the family friendly policies of President Donald Trump. She noted that his daughter Ivanka previously worked to enact parental leave for federal workers with the president’s support.

”I have a feeling President Trump is probably aware of the situation,” said Luna, who attended a White House Women’s History Month event Wednesday. “And I have a feeling that yesterday, his speech was pretty straightforward on what he feels, that people should be inclusive with families.”

Congress

Trump says voters are mad at other Republicans, not him, as midterms approach

Published

3 hours ago

August 7, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

President Donald Trump said voters may seek to punish Republicans — but not him — in the November midterm elections, as GOP lawmakers sweat that affordability concerns and the war in Iran could mean Democrats flip the House and perhaps even the Senate.

“They’re angry at Republicans,” Trump said in an interview with Punchbowl News that aired Friday. “But they’re not angry at me. They’re not angry at me, but they are angry at Republicans.”

The GOP faces the prospect of heavy losses this November, as gas and grocery prices remain stubbornly high due in part to the White House’s five-month-long war in Iran. The administration’s guidance on campaign trail messaging has been “tone deaf,” House Republicans fear.

Meanwhile, the president’s approval rating has tumbled since he returned to the Oval Office last year, and even his biggest supporters have grown frustrated over his Middle East war.

And with a messy, jam-packed slate of primaries now all but in the rearview mirror, Democrats are determined to go on offense. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has 58 seats on its midterm target map that stretches into redder territory — while still facing an uphill climb to take the Senate.

Trump has a massive war chest at his disposal. His MAGA Inc. super PAC reached $400 million in June. The president told Punchbowl he plans to use it to “help Republicans,” but he stressed that he faces no pressure in this campaign cycle.

“I said to somebody, ‘Wait a minute, you don’t understand, I won,’” Trump said, referencing his 2024 presidential election victory. “I’m not campaigning.”

The biggest issue for Republicans this year? That Trump himself is not on the ballot, he said.

“If I don’t run, will those people go out and vote? And that’s the one thing I can’t tell, I’m going to ask them to,” he said.

Congress

Capitol agenda: Senators find their exit strategy

Published

5 hours ago

August 7, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The Senate’s plan to get out of town is coming together.

Majority Leader John Thune teed up a final vote on the Russia sanctions legislation for this morning, as well as a confirmation vote for dozens of nominees and a procedural step on a stopgap funding bill.

But there’s still a number of questions that need to be answered if Thune wants to adjourn for recess by the end of the day:

— BLANCHE’S FATE: President Donald Trump’s pick for attorney general needs to secure at least one more vote to be confirmed before the break.

It looks like it’s all up to Sen. Bill Cassidy after Sen. Lisa Murkowski announced Friday morning she is opposed. Thune indicated Thursday night Blanche’s fate was uncertain and that leaders were “still working to get the final vote.”

— SAVE AMERICA ACT: Thune said to expect a vote related to the SAVE America Act as well as an initial vote on a budget blueprint for a third party-line spending bill — which includes elements of Trump’s election security legislation.

The decision to hold the budget vote comes after two Republican senators, granted anonymity to speak candidly, told Blue Light News Thursday they believed Sen. Mike Lee or another member of the GOP’s right flank would have otherwise forced a vote on the framework.

But as we’ve previously reported, Republicans don’t believe the budget resolution has the votes within the conference to be adopted — meaning the expected initial vote today will fail to clear a simple majority threshold.

And it’s not clear Lee or like-minded senators will be satisfied and allow for lawmakers to adjourn for recess without more action on the elections measure. The senator has made similar threats over the past year but has never followed through.

— TIME AGREEMENT: GOP leaders need to strike an agreement to finish other business, including passing the stopgap government funding bill and advancing a college sports bill.

At this point, any single senator could still object to expediting the chamber’s agenda, which would derail Thune’s goal of getting members out of town by the end of the day.

“We’ve been having these conversations with Democrats trying to figure out what’s the path,” Thune said.

“We’ll see how it goes,” he added.

What else we’re watching:

— GOP EXPECTS CRYPTO BILL DELAY: The Senate will leave for the chamber’s August recess without holding a vote on a landmark cryptocurrency bill, according to three people with knowledge of the matter. Thune may still file cloture on the bill, but it likely won’t come to the floor until lawmakers return to Washington next month, two of the people said.

— COLLEGE SPORTS BILL STUMBLES: Sens. Ted Cruz and Maria Cantwell’s legislation to impose new guardrails on college sports is looking increasingly unlikely to hit the floor this week. Eleven senators objected to expedited consideration of the Protect College Sports Act after Thune filed cloture earlier this week, two people familiar with discussions told Blue Light News.

— OGLES OUSTED: GOP House leaders lost an incumbent — and a perennial headache — with Rep. Andy Ogles’ primary defeat in Tennessee Thursday night. His loss to former Tennessee Agriculture Commissioner Charlie Hatcher represents the second Trump-endorsed candidate to lose a primary this week.

Jordain Carney, Mia McCarthy, Andrew Howard and Jacob Wendler contributed to this report.

Congress

Lisa Murkowski says she will oppose Blanche, endangering his confirmation

Published

7 hours ago

August 7, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Todd Blanche’s attorney general nomination is on the brink after Sen. Lisa Murkowski announced Friday that she would oppose confirming him.

The Alaska Republican said in a statement that she did not believe Blanche, who has been serving as acting attorney general since April, would act to rein in President Donald Trump and reverse the “politicization—even weaponization” of the Justice Department that has “accelerated” under Trump.

“The country needs an Attorney General who will check the worst impulses of this administration,” she said. “I hope Mr. Blanche is able to achieve that, if confirmed, but I simply do not have confidence that will be the case.”

Blanche’s fate is now thought to come down to Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, who has been increasingly critical of the president since losing his renomination campaign to a Trump-backed Republican earlier this year.

Cassidy met with Blanche alongside Murkowski Wednesday afternoon but hasn’t yet said how he will vote. Blanche has to win his support in order to be confirmed, given unified opposition from Democrats and opposition from Murkowski and Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine).

The extended absence of Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky for health reasons has also left Republicans short of a vote.

Murkowski cited Blanche’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files and the settlement agreement reached between Trump and the IRS under his watch as well as DOJ’s “repeated targeting” of Trump’s political enemies.

Senate Republicans rejecting Blanche would be a significant blow to Trump, who has pressured GOP senators to support Blanche over the past week as his nomination has been in limbo. And it would come as he’s already fuming at the conference, and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, over their inability to end the legislative filibuster and pass the elections bill known as the SAVE America Act.