Aaron Fritschner Profile picture
Oct 4, 2023 15 tweets 5 min read Read on X
Pretty evident people don't understand a key piece of House Dems' thinking on McCarthy and governance of the House. The idea that we acted out of schadenfreude or pique with no thought to the legislative outlook is, of course, silly nonsense. Here's what the takes are missing-
On Saturday morning we had no idea what was happening. Scalise told the GOP they were moving bills that signaled imminent shutdown. This is what we expected. Then McCarthy suddenly and unexpectedly did an about face and announced a vote on a CR. We didn't know what to make of it
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How to interpret this? McCarthy has resisted doing this all along, the wingnuts threatened to kick him out if he did it and he was running every play at their call. My immediate read was he wanted and expected us to vote against the suspension so we would be blamed for a shutdown
I said this the (see below). And our members believed it, in fact without naming names I can say I heard it from multiple members yesterday as they were weighing how to vote, and that was with hindsight about what happened.

So in this moment, you look to McCarthy for signals—
And what signals is McCarthy sending us?

Dems: "We would like to read the $200 billion, 71-page bill we've never seen. You promised 72 hours but we'll settle for 90 minutes."

McCarthy: GFY
Dems: well we are going to take that time, but we are satisfied, we'll pass your bill to help you get out of the jam you created for yourself

McCarthy: the Democrats wanted to shut down the government and f*ck the troops Image
People want us to give the guy credit for stopping a shutdown but it is still not clear to me right now sitting here writing this that he *intended* to do that.

This really matters and not just on an emotional level- the resolution set up not one but two new legislative problems
Now we have to pass an omnibus or face a shutdown again by Thanksgiving AND we have to fund military assistance to Ukraine pretty soon. But we are told McCarthy is going to help us there, he has made an agreement to help Ukraine.

And what does McCarthy say about that? This:
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And what is McCarthy signaling to us on funding? He's going to steer us directly back into the crazy cuts and abortion restrictions, the Freedom Caucus setting the agenda, breaking his deal with Biden, and driving us towards a shutdown in November
x.com/Olivia_Beavers…
Ok we are reasonable people, maybe he's just telling them what they have to hear and he'll screw them at the last minute. So what's he saying to us privately? What reason is he giving us to think any of this is going to turn out well if we help him? None.
x.com/JakeSherman/st…
The supposed "institutional interest" would have us not only put out Republicans' many fires for them, it would have us do so based on our specific belief and trust that *McCarthy is lying*. Like, his lying is supposed to be a good thing, and what sells the arrangement for us.
A speakership founded upon Democrats' trust that McCarthy will lie to his own guys and not to us is not rational, folks! It isn't sustainable or reasonable and it's no way to run the House. We needed him to give us any reason to help him and he very intentionally did not do so.
People say "he couldn't make a deal it would compromise his power" and they're just wrong, that was a solvable problem. He could've publicly or privately given us a sense the CR was good faith and we were going to get through the omnibus, stave off a shutdown, and help Ukraine.
This came down to trust, and that's the word I saw and heard from House Democrats more than any other word. We did not trust Kevin McCarthy and he gave us no reason to. He could have done so (and I suspect saved his gavel) through fairly simple actions. He chose not to do that.
Even after all that happened - January 6th, the debt limit crisis, his vengeance against our members, breaking his word to the President, impeachment, empowering the right wing - there were Democrats who were imho willing to help McCarthy if he had given them a reason. He didn't.

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More from @Fritschner

Oct 2
Plenty of projects on Russ Vought's cancellation list in Republican districts, and not just ones in blue states.

In some cases he cancelled projects hosted or headquartered in a state on his list, but the project itself is elsewhere.

Two of these are in South Carolina
Some award amounts are small to middling, but some are quite large.

This hydrogen project spanning much of Washington, Oregon, and western Montana is a *$1 Billion* award.

It spans 5 congressional districts, 3 of which are Republican-represented
When I saw this list, I said to myself, "well he's definitely forgotten Rhode Island. Two Dem Senators, no R Governor, didn't vote for Trump... he just forgot it."

Vought did forget the Ocean State in this tweet but sadly it is on the cancellation list.
Read 9 tweets
Oct 1
Your own fact check discredits the claim Republicans made on this, not to mention the other outlets who rightly called it "false," "misleading," and "a lie." What you are doing is helping Republicans erase millions of Americans on Medicaid whose healthcare they cut
"Democrats are accusing the White House of lying, saying illegals can’t access programs like Medicare and Medicaid. While that’s technically true, some lawfully present immigrants were eligible for the federal health programs"

That does not square with these statements! Unreal! Image
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Republicans' goal all year has been to deceive the public into thinking the people harmed by the $1 trillion in Medicaid cuts they passed are all immigrants.

This is flatly untrue, the vast majority of people harmed by those cuts by loss of care or rising costs are U.S. citizens
Read 4 tweets
Sep 12
The mortgage fraud claim against Lisa Cook is false, per documents obtained by Reuters. Bill Pulte's accusation, the sole pretext Trump used to fire her from the Fed, was that she claimed two homes as primary residence. These docs show she did not. reuters.com/world/us/fed-g…
“The document, dated May 28, 2021, was issued to Cook by her credit union in the weeks before she completed the purchase and shows that she had told the lender that the Atlanta property wouldn’t be her primary residence. “ Image
The documents cited by Pulte include standardized federal mortgage paperwork which stipulates that each loan obtained by Cook for the Atlanta and Michigan properties is meant for a “primary residence.” BUT—
Read 5 tweets
Jul 1
So- the House.

The vote math is the same as the Senate: Republicans can only lose 3, a fourth kills it assuming all present/voting. As in the Senate there's one solid no via a libertarian contrarian from Kentucky.

I don't feel a lot of suspense, I think they'll pass this as is
Here is how I see it going.

There are three publicly stated points of opposition remaining after various controversial bits (AI moratorium, public lands sale, etc) were removed, which was inevitable.

The three remaining issues with constituencies are: energy, Medicaid, debt.
The constituencies on energy and Medicaid have substantial overlap, these are """"moderates""" as the press shorthand has it.

They've written letters about how they really like clean energy and the jobs it creates in their district and how their constituents depend on Medicaid
Read 9 tweets
May 16
One of the most significant moments of the 2026 cycle likely happened Tuesday night during the Ways and Means markup of the tax portion of Republicans' reconciliation bill.

It got no attention at the time and little since, but it is wildly important. Here's what happened--
Ways & Means Republicans released stub bill text Friday, then full text Monday afternoon. This gave Congress' nonpartisan tax scorekeeper, the Joint Committee on Taxation, little time to score the bill in time for the markup.

JCT is our source for numbers on what the bill does.
After opening remarks, this markup begins with technical questions to the Chief of Staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation, Tom Barthold, about the bill. An hour in, the top Dem on tax, @RepThompson asked Tom Barthold: where are our distribution tables
Read 16 tweets
Apr 3
Trump just opened up a procedural avenue for Dems to force votes on the tariffs he announced yesterday. A quick explainer-
Each Trump tariff uses specific legal authorities.

Sector-specific tariffs (eg steel) use Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act.

Tariffs on all imports from X country use the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) which requires declaration of a national emergency
Trump's tariffs on nearly all imports from Canada, Mexico, and China are all predicated on specific declarations of national emergency under the National Emergencies Act: Image
Read 11 tweets

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