On Friday, Wisconsin Republican Representative Mike Gallagher announced he will be resigning his House seat, effective April 19th. He had previously announced he would not be seeking re-election, although his reasons for leaving office in April are not clear.
A statement from Congressman Mike Gallagher. pic.twitter.com/dOBcM8kbNV
— Rep. Gallagher Press Office (@RepGallagher) March 22, 2024
This resignation means that House Republicans must vote in absolute unison on every measure to ensure passage without crossover votes from Democrats.
His early departure will mean that Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., can only afford to lose one GOP lawmaker on any vote that falls along party lines. That will likely remain the case until June, when there’s a special election to replace ex-Rep. Bill Johnson, R-Ohio.
A special election to replace ex-Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., is set to take place in May. McCarthy’s former seat in California’s 20th Congressional District is a safe red seat, so it’s likely going to give Johnson a GOP win.
Before that, however, is an April 30 special election to replace Rep. Brian Higgins, D-N.Y., a longtime left-wing lawmaker who departed earlier this year. That election will likely see Democrats add to their tally, which would keep the House majority at one seat.
The timing of this move is interesting. As my colleague Streiff recently reported in discussing the resignation of Colorado Republican Ken Buck, several more resignations may be on the table — and Rep. Gallagher was not one of the ones named; things may indeed get worse before (if) they get better.
Previously on RedState: More GOP Resignations Loom As Speaker Johnson Pleads With Members to Stop Primarying Other GOPers
Streiff writes:
On his way out, Buck dropped an ominous statement. When asked if he was catching crap from colleagues over his no-notice resignation — neither Speaker Johnson nor Majority Leader Scalise was told in advance —he said, “I think it’s the next three people that leave that they’re going to be worried about.”
There is no more information about who those three might be, but a safe bet is that they would come from the members who have announced their retirement.
- Debbie Lesko (AZ-08)
- Brad Wenstrup (OH-02)
- Kay Granger (TX-12)
- Michael Burgess (TX-26)
But the baffling part comes from Wisconsin’s election laws around the timing of special elections for House vacancies. The Wisconsin code section, “Regulations on Special Elections,” part 4(b), states:
A vacancy in the office of U.S. senator or representative in congress occurring prior to the 2nd Tuesday in April in the year of the general election shall be filled at a special primary and election. A vacancy in that office occurring between the 2nd Tuesday in April and the 2nd Tuesday in May in the year of the general election shall be filled at the partisan primary and general election.
Representative Gallagher has announced his resignation for April 19th, after the deadline for a special election, in effect depriving the House GOP of one (possible) Republican vote until the general election, instead of in a special election. It’s hard to see a reason for that other than it being a calculated move. If he had announced his resignation as effective immediately, a new (hopefully) Republican Representative could have been seated months before the new Congress takes office in January of 2025.
This places Republican control of the House of Representatives on a knife’s edge at a very contentious time when the GOP is dealing with a fair amount of intra-party conflict.
See Related: BREAKING: House Passes $1.2 Trillion Spending Package to Avert Shutdown
‘He’s Already in the Arms of Democrats’: MTG Explains Why She Filed Motion to Vacate Speaker’s Chair
It is belaboring the obvious to point out that much will depend on this fall’s election, the number of open seats that will appear between now and then, whether former President Trump pulls out a victory and, if so, how long his coattails end up being. A second Trump administration, if forced to deal with one or both houses of Congress in Democrat hands, will doubtless see a repeat of the Impeach-a-Palooza at the end of President Trump’s first term; he was impeached the first time in 2019, acquitted in the Senate in February of 2020, while his second impeachment took place in 2021 a week before his term ended, with the Senate acquittal in February of 2021, after Trump had left office. With this as precedent, it’s hard to see how Congressional Democrats would, given another majority, behave with any more dignity in 2025 than they did in 2019-2021.
And now, at a time when every single vote counts, the GOP majority in the House just plain can’t get any narrower.
