The Week In Politics Oct. 14-20
It’s week three of Politics Explained, and things on Capitol Hill are as chaotic as ever! For those of you who are new here, we’ve built this website for people who are hungry to learn about politics. We cover the major happenings on Capitol Hill in compact weekly blogs, creating an easy way for you to stay in the loop. As mentioned before, this week has been stacked with even more chaos and even more uncertainty, so let’s dive right into it.
As chaos ensues all over the world, legislation such as budget requests from President Biden to help Ukraine and Israel need to be passed, but the House can’t seem to get its act together. House Leadership continues to remain uncertain. Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH) has failed three times to get enough votes for Speaker of the House. After recently saying he would try again to gain support for the leadership spot but not force another vote, he changed his mind and announced that he would force another vote to try and become leader of the House. During the period of time when Jordan believed he would take a break from trying to get elected as Speaker of the House, he supported the plan to give Representative Patrick T. McHenry (R-NC) power as the interim or substitute Speaker. Now you may be confused, wondering who this McHenry guy is and why he’s the Speaker now? To briefly explain, after the 9/11 attacks, a rule was passed where the Speaker of the House would have to secretly create a list of lawmakers that would act as a substitute or a “Pro Tempore”* Speaker if, for whatever reason, the position was not filled. Patrick McHenry happened to be on the top of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s list, and now McHenry is the Pro Tempore speaker. So, now you may be wondering, if we have a leader for now, why can’t the House do anything? Legislation needs to be passed, wars are happening all over the world, what are we waiting for? Well, because we were not expecting this situation to happen, the power that this “Pro Tempore Speaker” holds is unknown and yet to be defined. A debate over this is what is causing so much divide in the House right now, as centrist lawmakers are pushing to pass a resolution to give McHenry power to execute legislative business for a certain amount of time, and far right Republicans think that giving power to McHenry will give power to Democrats, something they do not want.
President Joe Biden visited Israel this week, following Hamas’ attacks and what is shaping up to be the start of a war. This served as a statement to the influence that the U.S. has over the area and the allyship the U.S. continues to hold with Israel. Biden has also stressed the need for humanitarian aid to Palestinians. While giving advice to Israel, President Biden warned of not making the same mistakes the U.S. did, stating that, “Justice must be done,” and “I caution this: While you feel that rage, don't be consumed by it. After 9/11 we were enraged in the United States. While we sought justice and got justice, we also made mistakes.” During the visit, Biden also announced $100 million in aid to the Palestinians, convinced Israel to agree to allow humanitarian aid to flow into Gaza, and persuaded Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sissi to open up a vital land crossing into southern Gaza. Protests against this war also continue, as over 300 pro-Palestine protestors who were calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, were arrested for protesting in one of the office buildings of the House.
Another hot topic on Capitol Hill is the situations of Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.), as they are being called to resign. Menendez is in this situation because of a Federal indictment accusing him of conspiring to act as a foreign agent and accepting bribes. He is accused of accepting these bribes to use his position to benefit businessmen who were willing to pay him, and the Government of Egypt in exchange for hundreds of thousands of dollars, which included gold bars, cash, and a Mercedes-Benz (convertible). Santos, on the other hand, is being indicted on accusations of stealing the identities of campaign donors and using their credit cards for his own personal use. He has also recently gone viral for an outburst he had, accusing a man of being a “terrorist sympathizer”. Check out an entertaining video of that here if you’re interested.
*For the time being
