Speaker Mike Johnson tries and fails to derail proxy voting for new moms in Congress

In the House, before a bill can be voted on, members adopt a measure to establish ground rules for how the legislation will be considered. It’s known as adopting a rule, and the vast majority of the time, it’s little more than a procedural speed bump, because members tend to vote with their parties to begin the process.

During Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s tenure as House speaker, she literally never lost a rule vote. During former Republican Reps. John Boehner’s and Paul Ryan’s tenures, they also never lost such a vote.

But in the last Congress, then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy lost three of these votes, and after he was stripped of his gavel, his Republican successor, Mike Johnson, lost four.

This year, it’s happened again. NBC News reported:

For those who might benefit from a refresher, let’s review how we arrived at this point, because it’s an unusual political fight.

Many American workplaces include some kind of maternity leave policy, but Congress isn’t one of them. In U.S. history, 12 federal lawmakers have given birth during their tenures, and in each instance, they were put in a difficult situation: As a recent New York Times report explained, these members “can take time away from the office without sacrificing their pay,” but they “cannot vote if they are not present at the Capitol.”

For many members, it’s time for a change. In fact, Democrats are championing a measure that would change congressional rules to allow proxy voting for new parents for up to 12 weeks. While the era of bipartisan policymaking sometimes seems to be a thing of the past, in this instance, several Republicans — including far-right Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida — have partnered with Democrats to approve the reform.

And why not? It’s a pro-family, apolitical idea that doesn’t cost anything. At face value, it seems tough to imagine why anyone would oppose such a change.

And yet, the House speaker, who took full advantage of proxy voting during the pandemic five years ago, has fought tooth and nail against the bipartisan reform effort, insisting that it’s unconstitutional.

This prompted Luna to go around her party leaders with a discharge petition, which received the necessary support and was poised to force an up-or-down vote.

So Johnson tried to derail the effort. He failed spectacularly, as nine GOP members voted with Democrats to keep the bipartisan reform measure alive.

In theory, this set the stage for a floor vote on the change within two days. In practice, Johnson decided to throw the House’s legislative schedule for the week out the window, telling members there won’t be another floor vote until next week. (Republicans were supposed to pass their misguided SAVE Act this week. That’s no longer going to happen.)

Democratic Rep. Brittany Pettersen of Colorado, whose second child was born in January and who’s helped to champion the reform bill, was asked after Tuesday’s vote about her message to GOP leaders. “We said, ‘Don’t f--- with moms,’” she replied.

The developments were the latest in a series of embarrassments for Johnson, but the Louisiana Republican is reportedly exploring new ways to defeat the effort to allow new moms to vote remotely. Watch this space.