Ryan-set terms are bitter pill for some
WASHINGTON — Fractious conservatives resisted Paul Ryan’s appeals to rally around him for House speaker Wednesday, suggesting fresh trouble ahead in the Republican struggle between party pragmatists and party purists.
The resistance casts doubt on whether Ryan, the GOP’s 2012 vice presidential nominee, can get the support from all factions of the House that he says he needs before he’ll run for speaker.
The Wisconsin congressman has voiced reluctance to take the post, but mainstream party leaders have asked him to run for the job, after conservatives pushed Speaker John Boehner to resign and then pressured the House majority leader to withdraw his candidacy.
On Wednesday, some House members took issue with Ryan’s suggestions for changing congressional rules and even his desire to balance his family life with the demands of the job.
“No other speaker candidate came in and said ‘here’s the list of my demands, either meet those or I’m not going to do this,’” Rep. Tim Huelskamp of Kansas, a member of the hard-line House Freedom Caucus, complained the day after Ryan outlined the conditions for his candidacy. “Speaker’s a big job. And it’s not a 9 to 5 job. So there are a lot of questions to be answered.”
Rep. Raul Labrador of Idaho, another Freedom Caucus member, said: “I think it’s pretty presumptuous to say that Paul Ryan is the only one who can win this.”
Rep. Mo Brooks of Alabama questioned Ryan’s plans to cut down on fundraising travel that’s associated with the speaker’s job in order to spend more time in Janesville, Wis., with his wife and their three school-aged children. “There is a plethora of candidates for speaker of the House out there who have the time necessary to do the job,” Brooks said.
Several complained about Ryan’s proposal to change the process for a “motion to vacate the chair” — the procedure that some conservatives threatened to use against Boehner.
“I like Paul Ryan a lot. I like Thomas Jefferson better,” said Rep. Mick Mulvaney of South Carolina, a Freedom Caucus leader who said Jefferson created the rule.
But after Ryan met with the hard-line group late Wednesday, Labrador said about twothirds of the Freedom Caucus’ members said they supported him for speaker.
“We are sending a message that he has a majority of support,” Labrador said. “We are going to send out a statement, and the ball is in Paul Ryan’s court.”
The group members held off on an official endorsement because they couldn’t achieve the 80 percent agreement that such an announcement would require.
“A supermajority of the House Freedom Caucus has voted to support Paul Ryan’s bid to become the next Speaker of the House,” the group said in a statement. “Paul is a policy entrepreneur who has developed conservative reforms dealing with a wide variety of subjects, and he has promised to be an ideas-focused Speaker who will advance limited government principles and devolve power to the membership.”
The group previously endorsed Rep. Daniel Webster of Florida, a low-key former speaker of the House in Florida who’s focused on “pushing down” on what he calls the “pyramid of power” in the House.
Another previously declared candidate, Rep. Jason Chaffetz of Utah, has stepped aside and endorsed Ryan.
The Freedom Caucus has grown increasingly isolated, with complaints growing louder from other Republicans about the caucus’s veto power over the daily workings of the House and its next speaker.
“They have to decide if they want to be part of this team, if they want to move forward an agenda that can make the American people proud,” said Rep. Carlos Curbelo of Florida.
BOEHNER ENDORSEMENT
Ryan on Wednesday was making the rounds to the three major House caucuses whose endorsements he is seeking as a condition for running for speaker. It’s a job the 45-year-old is exploring, he says, out of a sense of duty after Boehner announced his resignation and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy withdrew from the running.
Ryan has made clear that he does not want to be the latest victim of Republican dysfunction and will run only if it becomes clear that he can unify the House GOP.
“I won’t be the third log on the bonfire,” he said.
Ryan’s announcement that he was willing to serve came as a relief to many of his colleagues, who wondered if anyone would be willing to step up and take the job under the current circumstances.
“There’s only one guy I think who can unite us,” said Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla., who counts Ryan’s in-laws as constituents and has known the family for years. “There’s one guy with national stature. I think Paul Ryan is the best guy to put 218 votes-plus up on the board.”
At a news conference Wednesday morning, Boehner endorsed Ryan but noted that the decision was not up to him and acknowledged that it was still uncertain whether Ryan would be the Republicans’ nominee.
Boehner, who hopes to leave Congress at the end of this month, sought to move the process forward, scheduling secret-ballot House GOP elections for Oct. 28, to be followed by a floor vote in the full House the next day.
“Listen I think Paul Ryan would make a great speaker, but this decision is up to the members,” he said. “I think last night went very well, and hopefully by the end of the week, we’ll have a nominee.”
Later Wednesday Ryan met with the mainstream conservative Republican Study Committee, and he was to meet with the establishment-aligned Tuesday Group today. Both groups are expected to support him. The big question mark is whether the Freedom Caucus will reach the 80 percent needed to make its endorsement official.
Ryan, who heads the Ways and Means Committee, is known for creating a conservative GOP budget that slashed spending on social programs. But he’s now coming under attack from outside groups that accuse him of being insufficiently conservative, citing his support for comprehensive immigration legislation and government bailouts.
“If I can be a unifying figure in our conference, I’m willing to step up and be one, it’s just that simple,” he said after Wednesday’s meeting with the Freedom Caucus. “If not, then it’s OK, I’ll just go back to Ways and Means.”
One of Ryan’s first tasks if elected speaker would be dealing with a Dec. 11 deadline to pass spending legislation or face a shutdown. Even before that, Congress must raise the nation’s borrowing limit in two weeks’ time or face an unprecedented default.