The new legislature opens on Tuesday at the Congress. Before you are struggling with the Democratic President, Joe Biden, the Republicans must first overcome their dissensions for the election of the speaker in the lower room.
MO12345lemonde with AFP
The official rocking is scheduled for Tuesday, January 3 at 12 noon in Washington (6 p.m. in Paris). The new members of the US Congress, elected during the midterms that took place in November, must meet in order to take the oath for two years. This will be the moment when the Republicans will take control of the House of Representatives, and, for the first time since his inauguration, the President of the United States, Joe Biden, will have to deal with a divided parliament: his Democratic Party has kept control of the Senate, but the republican opposition won a very thin majority in the lower chamber.
“The Americans are ready for a turning point after two calamitous years under the leadership of the single Democratic party,” said elected Republican, who have promised to open a Kyrielle of investigations on the management by Joe Biden of the Pandemic or The American withdrawal from Afghanistan.
But, before launching such hostilities, they must agree to elect the president of the House of Representatives, which is not obvious as the divisions within the Party are strong. The election of the speaker, the third most important character in American policy after the president and the vice-president, will take place in the hemicycle Tuesday, by a simple majority vote.
Kevin McCarthy Weakened
Seven years after his first attempt, Kevin McCarthy, who has led the Republican group since 2014 to the Lower Congress Chamber, hopes to keep his revenge. But the elected representative of California is weakened by the counter-performance of the Republicans in the mid-term elections, the “giant wave” predicted by the conservatives not having materialized.
The party has only 222 seats and it will take 218 votes for it to be elected. However, a small group of elected officials very close to Donald Trump said he would pose his conditions before supporting him. They accuse him of not sufficiently defending the former president. Three even publicly said they would vote against him. “Kevin does not believe in anything, he has no ideology,” tackled Matt Gaetz, turbulent elected from Florida.
Kevin McCarthy seems to want to give them wages to prevent history from stuttering: in 2015, he had already failed to become president of the House of Representatives in front of a sling in the right wing of the party. But either he cannot afford to go too far and alienate the moderate republicans. Although its room for maneuver is reduced, it does not have credible competitor for the moment. Only the name of group leader Steve Scalie circulates as another possibility without his chances seem serious.
systematic opposition?
With the majority republicans in the House, Joe Biden and the Democrats will therefore not be able to pass new major projects. But with a Senate in the hands of the Democrats, either their rivals.
Will Republicans take refuge in systematic opposition? For that, they would have to block while some of their elected officials have – as during the budget vote before Christmas – voted with the Democrats.
The election of the speaker will therefore also serve to measure their nuisance capacity for the president. Being facing a hostile room could prove to be a political boon for Joe Biden, if he confirms his intention to represent himself in 2024 – a decision he must announce at the start of the year. In the event of legislative paralysis, he will undoubtedly reject the fault of blocking on weakened republicans, thus hoping to turn the situation to his advantage.