Remember all the hullabaloo over Weeper of the House John Boehner and Tea-Publicans in Congress threatening to sue the tyrant president for not implementing the Affordable Care Act fast enough, something they voted more than 54 times to repeal?
Whatever happened with Boehner’s lawsuit against the president?
You will be shocked — shocked I tell you! — to learn that the “Worst. Speaker. Ever.” has yet to file his frivolous lawsuit. If you listen to the tee-vee talking heads tell the tale, you probably thought this lawsuit had been filed months ago.
Steve Benen writes, House GOP’s anti-Obama lawsuit already in deep trouble:
After months of congressional Republicans condemning the tyranny of a lawless, out-of-control White House, GOP leaders announced they would file a historic lawsuit, taking President Obama’s outrageous abuses to the courts. The transgression at the top of the Republicans list? A delayed deadline for an obscure Affordable Care Act provision.
Two months later, the litigation is already in bad shape. For one thing, it still hasn’t been filed. For another, Republicans recently had to replace their legal team after the original firm that took the case walked away. (The GOP hired, of all people, Maureen McDonnell’s lead defense attorney.)
Yesterday, as Jennifer Haberkorn reported, a similar case to the one Republicans are pushing was thrown out of court.
A federal appeals court has summarily tossed a lawsuit challenging the Obama administration’s delay of Obamacare’s employer mandate — a case that is similar to the one that House Republicans plan to file against the president.
This suit was filed by the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, which argued that the delay could hurt doctors financially. But the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago on Friday said the plaintiffs don’t have a right to sue.
A unanimous three-judge panel threw out the case only three days after oral argument, a breakneck speed.
That’s not a good sign.
Indeed, given that the House GOP’s case hasn’t actually been filed, it’s not too late for lawmakers to save taxpayers a few bucks and put an end to the p.r. stunt while the process is still in its infancy.
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[L]et’s not forget that the Republicans are suing to require the Obama administration to immediately implement a policy the GOP lawmakers themselves do not actually want to see implemented.
In light of the 7th Circuit’s decision, GOP leaders could announce today that they’ve decided to save $350,000 and call this whole thing off. Six weeks before Election Day, voters might even be impressed.
The “Worst. Speaker. Ever.” is so incompetent that the nominal Speaker of the House, Senator Ted “Calgary” Cruz, and his band of Tea Party mutineers in the House are once again plotting a mutiny against the TanMan. The Hill reports, Conservatives plot to oust Boehner:
For months, several clusters of conservative lawmakers have been secretly huddling inside and outside the Capitol, plotting to oust John Boehner from the Speaker’s office when House Republicans regroup after the November elections.
The strategy — for now — seems disorganized and fluid: Find a way to push the Speaker’s race to a second ballot, create turmoil in the conference, portray Boehner as highly vulnerable and offer up an alternative.
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A number of conservative lawmakers, both in interviews on the record and on background, described enormous frustration with Boehner and his top lieutenants for taking too safe a political route ahead of the 2014 elections.
“In tough times, it doesn’t mean you play timid, it means to play bold, and I don’t see that. And you know what? Time’s up,” Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), who vowed to vote against Boehner, told The Hill in an interview. “I’m tired of the status quo of what’s going on in Washington, D.C. America’s tired, America’s angry and they’re scared, because they don’t have leaders in Washington, D.C.”
Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) was more succinct: “I’ll give him every bit as much support as I did last time.”
Gohmert in 2013 was one of a dozen Republicans who didn’t support Boehner for Speaker. Ten of them will return to the next Congress and have a vote on Boehner’s future.
Rep. Walter Jones (R-N.C.), also said he’ll again vote against Boehner, even though he admitted it could be a suicide mission.
A handful of other conservative rabble-rousers, including Reps. Steve King of Iowa and Tim Huelskamp of Kansas, declined to say whether they would vote to give Boehner a third two-year term.
“When he makes an announcement on what his career is, I’ll start to contemplate that, but I haven’t really given it any thought in any kind of broader discussion,” said King.
“I’ll just say let’s just see how this plays out,” said King, who backed Boehner for Speaker in 2013.
King told The Hill that “there have been a number of gatherings in the Capitol building and outside the Capitol building” focused on Boehner’s leadership, but he declined to provide more specifics about the meetings or offer up any names of potential challengers.
Jones, a second-generation congressman from coastal North Carolina, said he belongs to one of the groups holding anti-Boehner meetings. His group, made up of six to seven lawmakers, meets every few weeks in one of the members’ congressional offices.
“There’s a group of members who’d like to see a change in the leadership, and we believe sincerely there needs to be a new direction for the House,” Jones said in an interview just off the House floor. “If you’re gonna have a new direction, it starts at the top.”
That Jones is seeking to oust Boehner from power is no surprise. He’s been one of the Ohio Republican’s most vocal critics and doesn’t have much to lose by publicly campaigning against him. In late 2012, Boehner booted Jones and three other Tea Party-backed lawmakers from top financial committees for repeatedly bucking leadership (though Jones still serves on the Armed Services panel).
The informal anti-Boehner meetings, Jones said, are held randomly and without much notice: his administrative assistant will often receive an invitation by email with the time and place. One such meeting took place last week while Congress was wrapping up work on a stopgap spending bill and Syria legislation.
In fact, Jones acknowledged he didn’t even know who the members of the other groups were, though he said that was by design to avoid being targeted by the Speaker and his allies. At some point, however, these Boehner foes will have to step forward and “show they will stick together on a vote,” Jones said. Then, one of them can be offered up as a candidate.
Jones declined to identify any of the other members in his anti-Boehner group, but he said it was not the same as the group of House conservatives who frequently huddle with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), the Tea Party favorite and prospective 2016 presidential hopeful.
In a brief interview, Cruz denied that he was spearheading one of the groups seeking to oust the Speaker. “Leadership questions are for the House to decide,” the senator said. [Liar.]
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In the private election slated for the week of Nov. 10, Boehner will need 50 percent of the votes plus one to win what many expect to be his final term as Speaker. If the GOP picks up between five and eight seats this fall, that would bring its majority to roughly 240 seats. That means two or more other Boehner challengers would need to capture more than 120 backers combined to push the race to a second ballot and throw the process into chaos — a scenario most observers see as implausible.
A more likely scenario would come during the public roll call, just as it did during the coup attempt against Boehner in January 2013. About 20 Boehner defectors would need to hold the line, depriving him of the 218-vote simple majority he needs to win another two years as Speaker. Democrats would almost certainly withhold their votes for Boehner if they saw the GOP leader foundering.
“You’ve got to have 20 to 25 committed people that are willing to cut their wrist,” Jones explained, “and if you’re not willing to cut your wrist, you’re not really committed.”
If Boehner doesn’t win on the first roll call, lawmakers keep voting until someone wins a simple majority of the 435-member House. And even after several rounds of votes, Boehner still could prevail over potential challengers.
Boehner’s office has expressed confidence he will be the Speaker in the 114th Congress.
“[M]ost Republicans believe Boehner is in a much stronger position today than he was during the coup attempt two years ago, or during the government shutdown last year led by Cruz.”