On September 16, US Representative Mike Johnson (R-LA), acting in his role as Speaker of the House, sent that body’s members home until after the November midterm elections.
My knee-jerk reaction is gratitude. After all, as Gideon J. Tucker wrote in 1866, “no man’s life, liberty or property are safe while the legislature is in session.”
Conversely, if all those members of Congress are back home campaigning for re-election (or just enjoying a break), their opportunities to engage in criminal stupidity step down from wholesale to retail levels.
Heck, if we have to put up with Congress existing at all, I’d rather they convened once a year to collect their salaries for the year, then took the other 364 days off.
On a closer look, though, Johnson seems to have found a way to turn Tucker’s aphorism on its head, frequently using the absence of Congress to protect existing depredations, rather than the presence of Congress to drum up new ones.
“The House has now canceled at least 63 scheduled voting days this Congress, including nine days this month alone,” notes US Representative Ralph Norman (R-SC).
When Johnson thinks he’s going to lose a vote — with “lose” defined as upsetting or defying president Donald Trump — he just sends everyone home until he can whip a few more House members into line, or at least until the loss might come at a slightly less embarrassing point in the news cycle.
He’s done it with votes on EPA regulations.
He’s done it with votes related to the Epstein files.
This time he fled in terror, taking the entire House with him, from a privileged motion filed by outgoing US Representative Thomas Massie (R-KY).
Hellbound and Down 