House GOP leaders are racing to head off a vote being pushed by one of their own members on a measure that would allow lawmakers who are new parents to vote by proxy.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) has already gathered enough member signatures on a discharge petition to force a vote. But Speaker Mike Johnson, who argues that proxy voting is unconstitutional, is considering several options to prevent it from happening as Luna mulls the way forward.
They include trying to kill the discharge petition in the Rules Committee next week, according to three people with direct knowledge of the matter who, like others quoted in this story, were granted anonymity to discuss private talks. Some hard-liners are also floating a more drastic option: changing the House rules to effectively block future discharge petitions this Congress by making the process to trigger a fast-track floor vote much more burdensome, the three people said.
“There aren’t many good options here,” said one GOP lawmaker.
Right now, GOP leaders appear focused on trying to peel away some of the 11 Republicans who joined Luna in signing the discharge petition. Majority Leader Steve Scalise, Whip Tom Emmer and others have aggressively whipped members against the effort, according to three GOP lawmakers who have spoken with them.
Luna said Thursday she has been lobbied heavily herself by House Republican leaders to abandon her effort, which would allow for 12 weeks of proxy voting for new parents. She said they offered to bring her bill to the Rules Committee if she would agree to drop the discharge petition, but Luna has so far rejected that deal. She said she heard Republicans on the panel would block it from the floor.
”If you’re going to negotiate, you’re not going to be honest with the negotiations, there is no negotiation,” she said, later adding, “I am not going to destroy democracy by allowing female members to vote when recovering from birth.”
Luna said leaders are also threatening members who are backing her, telling them their bills will not come to the floor and that the party won’t be “helping with fundraising.” She said she was also offered committee assignments she had previously been denied as an enticement to end her proxy-voting push.
One Republican who joined Luna in the discharge effort, Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee, said “somebody” offered to bring a bill he sponsored to the floor in exchange for switching his vote.
“Voting against pregnant women, are y’all crazy?” Burchett said he responded.
A spokesperson for Johnson didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the strong-arm allegations.
Under House rules, Luna’s measure can be called up as privileged business seven legislative days after the completion of the discharge petition. That would tee up the effort for action early next week unless GOP leaders can find an off-ramp.
They aren’t at this point openly pursuing a permanent rules change, something that could invite a slew of other member demands for rules tweaks. One option Johnson and his leadership circle had been considering — changing House rules to make discharge petitions subject to a two-thirds majority rather than the current 218 signatures — is no longer considered likely after at least one Rules Committee Republican warned they wouldn’t support raising the threshold, according to two people with direct knowledge who were granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter.
Instead, hard-liners are floating other rules changes that would make it significantly harder to call up a discharged measure as privileged business, allowing for a fast-track vote.
Most Republicans are vehemently opposed to allowing proxy voting, which was widely used under Speaker Nancy Pelosi during the Covid pandemic from 2020 through 2023, when the GOP took back control of the chamber and abolished it.
“The speaker needs to kill it,” said Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.), a Freedom Caucus member who also sits on the Rules Committee.
Luna said the position of Norman, Johnson and other GOP opponents of proxy voting is at odds with the family friendly policies of President Donald Trump. She noted that his daughter Ivanka previously worked to enact parental leave for federal workers with the president’s support.
”I have a feeling President Trump is probably aware of the situation,” said Luna, who attended a White House Women’s History Month event Wednesday. “And I have a feeling that yesterday, his speech was pretty straightforward on what he feels, that people should be inclusive with families.”
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