Packing numbers and charts, Roy leads GOP rebellion against debt limit agreement
At the height of Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s search for his post in January, Texas Republican Rep. Chip Roy raced from meeting to meeting to make sure hardline conservatives got what they wanted before agreeing to support the California Republican.
One by one, almost all of their demands were met in what Mr. Roy would later call a “power-sharing” deal between Mr. McCarthy and his right flank. The far right won three seats on the influential House Rules Committee (one went to Mr. Roy); a commitment by Mr. McCarthy that Republicans would never raise the debt ceiling without major spending cuts; and a rule allowing any legislature to force a vote to expel the speaker if he fails to keep his promises.
Now Mr Roy, 50, the policy chair of the ultra-conservative House Freedom Caucus, who has emerged as the hard right’s spending expert, is accusing Mr McCarthy of reneging on the deal and is once again trying to exert his influence – this time with potentially serious consequences. He and his allies are seeking to quash the agreement McCarthy reached with President Biden to suspend the debt ceiling just days before the country heads for bankruptcy.
If not, he said, the House Freedom Caucus would have to take on Mr. McCarthy again. Several members have raised the idea of advocating for Mr McCarthy’s removal.
“If we can’t kill it, we’re going to have to regroup and rethink the whole leadership arrangement,” said Mr. Roy Tuesday on Glenn Beck’s radio show.
That’s a far cry from the position Mr. Roy was in several weeks ago, when he worked with House GOP leaders to get a much more conservative debt limit bill passed, which would have the loan limit alone canceled in exchange for substantial expenditure. cuts. Representative Garret Graves, a Louisiana Republican and an ally of Mr. McCarthy, said he grew to respect working closely with Mr. Roy on that package.
“I didn’t have an incredibly high opinion of Rep. Chip Roy to get into it. He’s one of my best friends now,’ Mr Graves said.
Now Mr Roy, who is a mix of legislative nonsense and high-profile firefighter, has circulated documents outlining all the different ways he believes Mr McCarthy’s 99-page debt limit agreement was, in his words, a “betrayal” is for conservatives. . In an easy-to-understand format, they explain step-by-step how the deal Mr McCarthy reached with Mr Biden falls short of Conservative demands to curb spending, streamline energy project permitting and impose strict work requirements for social security net benefits.
He and his allies see the country’s $31.5 trillion national debt as a bigger threat to America than the Treasury Department’s warning that the country could default on certain bills on June 5.
“No Republican should vote for this deal,” Mr. Roy said at a Freedom Caucus press conference Tuesday, hours before breaking with his party to try to block the measure from the floor in a House Rules vote Committee. . The attempt failed; only one other Republican joined him in opposing a measure to take the deal to a floor vote on Wednesday.
Still, ‘no’ votes to the legislation are beginning to pile up. By Tuesday afternoon, more than 30 House Republicans had spoken out against it.
“Bill is terrible for America,” said Louisiana Republican Rep. Clay Higgins.
Mr. McCarthy and his leadership team have been working hard to bolster support, disseminating their own charts and graphs of reduced spending. The bill appeared to be on track Wednesday, with a significant Democratic vote to offset GOP defectors.
But Mr. Roy’s charts fuel the arguments of other conservatives fighting the legislation. He circulated a four-page memo last month with talking points for other Republicans during the negotiations. He then posted two charts highlighting what he called the deal’s shortcomings.
Mr. Roy “gives the most succinct summary I’ve seen regarding the issues with the debt ceiling agreement,” Utah Republican Senator Mike Lee, who has pledged to postpone a Senate vote on the bill, wrote on Twitter.
Mr. Roy was born in Bethesda, Maryland and grew up in the Washington area. His father worked for the IRS and he received his law degree from the University of Virginia (football players Tiki and Ronde Barber, whom he befriended there, attended his wedding). But he learned hardball politics in Texas. He served as Senator Ted Cruz’s chief of staff and in many ways reflects the combative and expansive style of his former boss.
But unlike many in the Freedom Caucus, he is not an acolyte of former President Donald J. Trump. He voted to confirm Mr Biden’s victory and endorsed Florida Governor Ron DeSantis for president.
Mr. Roy likes to quote a scene from the movie “Braveheart” when describing how the Conservatives should deal with the debt limit. It’s the one where Scottish freedom fighters have formed a tight line, repeatedly commanding their leader, William Wallace, “Wait!” before launching a united spear attack on the British.
“My stance is hold the damn line,” he says.
Mr. Roy has claimed that one of Mr. McCarthy’s concessions to the hard right was a promise that nothing would come out of the Rules Committee without the support of all nine Republicans on the panel. On Tuesday, Republicans were split on the debt ceiling package, which went to the floor by a vote of 7 to 6, with South Carolina Republican Mr. Roy and Rep. Ralph Norman joining Democrats in voting against the measure.
Mr. Roy has said repeatedly that he feels betrayed by Mr. McCarthy.
“I think this is going to be a problem for him,” Colorado Republican Rep. Ken Buck said of Mr. McCarthy’s push to meet the debt ceiling deal. “They’re bleeding.”
He said he believed an effort to impeach Mr. McCarthy could be in the works if the speaker introduced the bill without a majority of Republicans. Mr Buck said he could see the number of Republicans opposed to the bill rising to more than 100 as lawmakers learned more about its contents.
Democrats see Mr. Roy’s tactics as putting the country at risk.
“This represents a record high of recklessness and stupidity,” Massachusetts Democrat Representative Jim McGovern said of Republican efforts to leverage the debt ceiling. He added, “Democrats had to be the adults in the room.”