{"id":21025,"date":"2015-10-11T08:02:17","date_gmt":"2015-10-11T15:02:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/john-boehners-here-to-stay-for-now-with-nothing-to-lose\/"},"modified":"2015-10-11T08:02:17","modified_gmt":"2015-10-11T15:02:17","slug":"john-boehners-here-to-stay-for-now-with-nothing-to-lose","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/john-boehners-here-to-stay-for-now-with-nothing-to-lose\/","title":{"rendered":"John Boehner’s here to stay, for now, with nothing to lose"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014<\/strong> Speaker John Boehner wants out. He really does.<\/p>\n

But the Ohio House Republican is staying put, for now \u2014 and that could improve the chances for a debt limit increase by early next month to avoid a market-shattering government default. His continued presence also might help lawmakers reach a bipartisan budget deal to head off a government shutdown in December.<\/p>\n

The tea party forces that pushed Boehner to plan his exit after nearly five years in the top job now have less leverage against a man with nothing to lose. Conservative hard-liners have caused further chaos by blocking the ascension of Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-California.<\/p>\n

What are they going to do now, threaten to force a vote to immediately oust Boehner?<\/p>\n

Nope.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes the dog catches the car and doesn\u2019t know what to do,\u201d Rep. Steve Stivers, R-Ohio, a Boehner ally, said of the House Freedom Caucus and other hard-right lawmakers.<\/p>\n

Boehner insists he wants to leave as scheduled at the end of October, but if Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin, won\u2019t agree to replace him, it may take a while for a consensus to form around an alternative.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile we go through this process, we\u2019ve got to continue to address the people\u2019s priorities. This institution cannot grind to a halt,\u201d Boehner told Republicans Friday morning in a closed-door session. \u201cIt is my hope \u2014 and indeed it is my plan \u2014 for this House to elect a new speaker before the end of October. But at the end of the day, that\u2019s really up to the people in this room.\u201d<\/p>\n

Excerpts of Boehner\u2019s remarks came from an official who was in the room. Not authorized to disclose them publicly, the official requested anonymity.<\/p>\n

Facing a fall of fiscal fights with the Obama administration, Boehner has said he doesn\u2019t want to leave a \u201cdirty barn\u201d for his successor. The toughest item, by far, is legislation that must pass by early November or so to increase the debt ceiling.<\/p>\n

Last year, Boehner orchestrated a debt ceiling increase by relying on just 28 Republicans and 193 Democrats \u2014 the exact opposite of the way the House is usually run.<\/p>\n

Then there are ongoing talks about easing spending curbs that have frozen the budgets of both the Pentagon and domestic agencies.<\/p>\n

\u201cJohn is going to try to clean the barn up as best he can,\u201d said Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Pa. \u201cHe\u2019s not going to clean the whole thing, but we can probably dispose of the debt ceiling. I hope we can reach a budget agreement.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boehner\u2019s penchant for relying on Democrats to make up for tea party defections on legislation like a 2013 tax increase and last month\u2019s temporary government funding bill got him in trouble with the right. There\u2019s little they can do if he follows the same strategy on the debt limit and a budget deal.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is ironic how smart John Boehner\u2019s looking,\u201d said Rep. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D. \u201cFrankly, all this talk of a fresh new face sounds very sweet on the surface, but we\u2019re not electing a student council president. His stock rises with the prospects of an alternative and the steadiness of his hand, the clarity of his positions \u2014 whether you like them or not \u2014 and the fact he\u2019s not prone to panic. It\u2019s all looking really good right about now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Conservatives suffered a setback on Friday when emboldened GOP moderates orchestrated a rarely successful petition drive to force legislation reauthorizing the Export-Import Bank onto the floor agenda later this month. The roster of more than three dozen GOP signatories included many Boehner loyalists.<\/p>\n

The 13-term lawmaker not only supports reviving the bank, which helps overseas sales of U.S. goods, he called an additional minutes-long House session on Monday that, under the arcane rules governing such petition efforts, sped up the House vote on the measure to the end of October rather than into November.<\/p>\n

His office says that wasn\u2019t the motivation for the unexpected pro forma session.<\/p>\n

A Boehner aide noted that the speaker has said he won\u2019t change his way of approaching this fall\u2019s treacherous set of issues. For instance, Boehner marched ahead last month with legislation to temporarily fund the government and rejected tea party calls to \u201cdefund\u201d Planned Parenthood at the risk of a government shutdown.<\/p>\n

Typically on tough votes it often looks like many GOP lawmakers cast \u201cno\u201d votes \u2014 to insulate themselves against criticism from conservative talk radio and Washington-based outside groups \u2014 while secretly rooting for the legislation to pass.<\/p>\n

The crowd that votes \u201cno\u201d but roots for bills to pass, however, appreciates it when Boehner turns to Democrats to extricate them from a tough spot.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s what we\u2019re dealing with: Hope yes, vote no,\u201d said Dent. \u201cSame thing will happen on the debt ceiling, same thing will happen on a budget agreement.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boehner\u2019s political maturity is a commodity that\u2019s sometimes in short supply in the House, making some Republicans wistful.<\/p>\n

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., said the speaker\u2019s election should be postponed until next year, with Boehner remaining as speaker in the meantime.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope he can stay \u2014 if he\u2019s willing to forgo some of his golf games and time with his grandbaby,\u201d she said, adding that she thinks Boehner would agree to serve into next year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014 Speaker John Boehner wants out. He really does. But the Ohio House Republican is staying put, for now \u2014 and that could improve the chances for a debt limit increase by early next month to avoid a market-shattering government default. His continued presence also might help lawmakers reach a bipartisan budget deal to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[65],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-21025","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-nation-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21025","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21025"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21025\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21025"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=21025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}