PROGRAMMING NOTE: We’ll be off next week for the holidays but back to our normal schedule on Tuesday, Jan. 2. WHAT THOSE LAWMAKER EXITS MEAN (AND DON'T MEAN) A single fact sums up the dire consequences of the House’s anarchic three weeks without a leader this fall: The last two people to wield the top gavel before Speaker Mike Johnson finally won it are now retiring. It’s not just Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and former acting Speaker Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) retiring, though. Thirty other House members are heading for the exit. The early wave of congressional departures is expected to crest again as the 2024 election gets closer. But it’s not a record-breaking number or retirements, or even a record-stretching one. The number of lawmakers bowing out is on the high side this cycle, but it follows a 20-year trend of earlier exits. That means the colleagues who remain in office have to keep working to rebuild the loss of institutional knowledge that inevitably results from House retirements. Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), the Rules Committee chair and unofficial dean of the House GOP, spoke for many fellow lawmakers: “This happens every time,” he said of the new round of retirements. But of course, this time is a little different. After a 117th Congress that began with an armed insurrection at their workplace, this year House members wrestled with a 15-ballot speakership slog in January followed by the October ouster of McCarthy and the chaos that followed. So lawmakers might be excused for assuring themselves that high turnover is normal, even healthy, given the constant challenge of governing in the social media era. McCarthy and McHenry are especially “hard to replace,” Cole said. Underscoring his point: Half of the current House GOP conference had never served in the majority until this year. Which makes it hard to draw on lessons from the past. And what an unsatisfying turn in the majority it has been for many Republicans — frustrated by their paltry margin of control, disunity within their ranks and a Democratic-controlled Senate where their legislation goes to die. The House voted 724 times, according to the clerk, and only 27 proposals became law during 2023 — a remarkable portrait of dysfunction. Many members who are leaving blame that gridlock. Those staying put worry that the chaos may drive serious legislative minds right out of Congress and hinder recruitment of candidates with goals other than name recognition. McHenry’s misery during his stint as speaker pro tempore was hard to miss; the firing of McCarthy forced him to preside over the grueling and divisive race to replace his friend. But his involuntary turn at the top wasn’t the only thing that pushed him to the exit. The Financial Services Committee chair was set to hit the House GOP’s term limit for holding a committee gavel at the end of this Congress, meaning that McHenry would have likely ceded power over the panel if he chose reelection. Rep. Kay Granger (R-Texas), who was in the same boat as Appropriations chair, will also retire next year. House Republicans’ term limits have a double-edged sword effect, giving younger members opportunities (McHenry is only 48), but then leaving them adrift when they have to hang up the gavel. Democrats have no such limits, creating an inverse dynamic. Their upward mobility on committees is stifled as chairs keep hanging on in office, enjoying the influence that a gavel provides. This cycle, Democrats count 12 relatively young members bailing out to run for higher office (compared with three Republicans leaving for that reason) — which partly explains why so many retirements are happening earlier this Congress. McHenry maintained his happy-warrior attitude about the molting of House members, recalling robust mentorship when he arrived as the chamber’s then-youngest member and vowing to try to pass along all that he’s learned. The House’s occasionally arcane and arduous rules are “not a bug” but “a feature,” he said. “My hope is that people develop a respect and love for the institution.” Cole, who’s sticking around, took a more pragmatic view. Competency comes with time and experience, he acknowledged, and so turnover can make governing harder. “You learn over time how to do this stuff,” he said of the nuts and bolts of legislating. Cole credited Armed Services Chair Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) and ranking member Adam Smith (D-Wash.), both veterans, for the “masterclass” they put on during this year’s politically volatile defense authorization bill debate. “The fewer those kinds of people you have,” Cole warned, “the more difficult it becomes.” — Katherine Tully-McManus GOOD EVENING! Welcome to Huddle, the play-by-play guide to all things Capitol Hill, on this Friday, Dec. 22, where we’re wishing you a happy and healthy holiday and a happy new year. See you right back here for the rest of the 118th Congress.
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