If conservatives want to oust John Boehner, they can.
Conservatives are brewing a plan to oust John Boehner if he cuts a bad deal on funding the government— including if he can’t cut federal subsidies to abortion giant Planned Parenthood. Leadership is worried about it, according to a Washington Post report.
Currently sitting idle in the bowels of the Capitol is a “Motion to Vacate the Chair,” proposed by Rep. Mark Meadows. If Meadows wanted to call it up on the floor, it’s unclear whether he could be blocked. With a majority, Boehner could be ousted, and a new House speakership election would be held.
If all 188 Democrats voted against Boehner, then conservatives would need 30 Republicans.
Here’s the quick math:
In January, 25 Republicans voted against John Boehner for speaker — that is, they voted for someone else, or voted “present.”
That wasn’t enough to keep Boehner under 218 then, and it wouldn’t be enough to boot Boehner this fall. But the number of Boehner opponents has certainly grown.
For one, it seems to be Rep. Jim Jordan quarterbacking the coup, and Raoul Labrador as his sidekick. Both of those men supported Boehner in January. Now you’re creeping towards 30.
Here’s another place to look for anti-Boehner votes: The June vote on the rule to advance to the debate over Trade Promotion Authority. Opposing a rule is taken as a more serious offense than opposing the speaker on legislation. Opposing a rule is like filibustering your own party. The 34 conservative “no” votes on the TPA rule was aptly called a “mutiny.”
That’s how leadership saw it. “Voting against the rule,” one Republican member told me, “they took it as voting against Boehner.”
Seventeen of those mutineers, notably including Jordan and Labrador, were Boehner supporters in January.
Add those two votes together — the anti-Boehner votes in January and the anti-TPA votes in June —and you have 42 likely Boehner opponents. You don’t even need all of them — only 30 of those 42 — and Boehner would be toast.
