Boise, Idaho

• The House of Representatives on Oct. 3, 2023, did something that had never been done before in the nation’s history: It ousted the speaker of the House.
• Kevin McCarthy, a California Republican, lost his job in a vote of 216 to 210.
• To look deeper than the surface machinations, The Conversation U.S. spoke with political scientist Charles R. Hunt at Boise State University.

What does the ouster say about the House’s ability to function, such as to pass a new budget in the next 45 days?

• When Americans think of a functioning democracy, they might think of bills getting passed on time, of Congress getting things done.
• But voters of all party affiliations are frustrated by the gridlock here, particularly over the past decade or two.
• The interesting thing about this situation with the speakership is that gridlock has traditionally been between the two parties.

Do House members want to do what the public wants them to do – get things done?

• Likewise, many Democrats back in 2019 or 2020, when they held the majority in the House, felt they had a responsibility to their mostly Democratic constituents to bring the fight to President Donald Trump.
• For some in the GOP, there is also this ideology of smaller government, less spending, lowering the national debt – the more typical conservative Republican priorities.
• The lack of a plan after McCarthy’s ouster seems to show that obstruction is kind of the point.

How can people understand these events in the context of America’s system of representative democracy?

• He and others just see that the way the House is conducting its business is not working.
• In Congress, those concerns are mainly coming from the far left and far right.
• They relate to the increasing polarization in this country, and Congress mirrors that growing division.

Why isn’t this kind of drama happening in the Senate?

• They can be drawn in very specific ways and gerrymandered and are more subject to geographic sorting, so you end up with really extreme districts, politically.
• They typically have to represent a lot more people than a House district, a much broader constituency.
• Rules like the filibuster and Unanimous Consent Agreements can force more moderate senators to work together to reach a kind of consensus.
• This creates a lot of the friction in the House between leadership and rank and file that you don’t typically see in the Senate.

What are the key differences that help explain how these different House members are behaving?

• It may not seem like it, but members of Congress have incentives for doing what they do.
• There are the incentives of the two parties, which is why they meet in their conferences and caucuses to strategize.
• But individual members also face very different pressures in their different districts, even if they’re in the same party.
• He faces no serious challenge in a general election against a Democrat because it’s mostly Republicans in the district.

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