Home Republican leaders will select new chairs for plenty of influential committees this week, individuals who can have the ability to assist ship on President-elect Trump’s priorities within the GOP trifecta over the following two years.
Whereas many of the committee chair positions are uncontested, a number of panels have leaders who’re departing Congress or are time period restricted in keeping with inside Home GOP guidelines. Except granted a waiver, Home GOP chairs could not serve greater than three consecutive phrases atop a committee, in a distinction from the Home Democratic Caucus, the place some senior leaders have led committees for a decade or extra.
The departing chairs have sparked aggressive races for vital panels, just like the Power and Commerce Committee and Monetary Companies Committee.
The brand new chairs will probably be chosen by members of the Home GOP Steering Committee, a panel of greater than 30 elected Republican leaders and regional representatives that recommends the chairs to the total Home GOP convention for formal approval.
The Steering Committee is listening to displays from the contenders on Monday and Thursday and is anticipated to make its picks by the tip of Thursday. The total GOP convention will seemingly rubber-stamp the picks the next week.
Listed below are the aggressive Home GOP chair races for the 119th Congress.
Power and Commerce Committee
Outgoing Power and Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rogers (R-Wash.) declined to hunt reelection, establishing a race for the influential panel between Rep. Brett Guthrie (R-Ky.) and Rep. Bob Latta (R-Ohio).
The Power and Commerce panel has jurisdiction over a broad vary of coverage points and federal departments, together with well being care, the Division of Power, the Meals and Drug Administration, and extra.
Latta is about to be essentially the most senior Republican on the committee and has expertise on all six of its subcommittees, together with stints chairing two subcommittees, on communications and know-how and on digital commerce and client safety. The 33 payments he has signed into regulation embrace measures that goal to broaden nuclear gasoline applications and enhance 5G protection.
Guthrie, in the meantime, has sat on 5 of the panel’s six subcommittees, and is chair of its well being subcommittee. His prime priorities for the following Congress embrace allowing reform for power manufacturing, and the race to 6G — guaranteeing the U.S. beats China to the event of the know-how. The West Level graduate can also be pitching his pleasant persona.
Monetary Companies Committee
With Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) on his approach out of Congress, the highest job on the Home Monetary Companies Committee is up for grabs — and a quartet of contenders are vying for the gavel.
Reps. Andy Barr (R-Ky.), French Hill (R-Ark.), Frank Lucas (R-Okla.) and Invoice Huizenga (R-Mich.) have all jumped into the race to succeed McHenry — who was term-limited — trying to lead the panel that has jurisdiction over Wall Road, the Federal Reserve, federal regulators and cryptocurrency, areas which might be positive to be distinguished within the second Trump administration.
Barr, the chair of the Subcommittee on Monetary Establishments and Financial Coverage, has touted a free-market capitalism philosophy, arguing that he’s somebody who “can build a bridge between those traditional Chamber of Commerce, Wall Street Republicans, and the America First populists who elected Donald Trump.” He’s additionally shut with Home Majority Chief Steve Scalise (R-La.), who has affect on the Steering Committee.
Hill, in the meantime, is the vice chair of the Home Monetary Companies Committee and the chair of its subcommittee on digital property, monetary know-how and inclusion. In that function, the Arkansas Republican has develop into referred to as a educated supply on cryptocurrency, and he has a invoice that might regulate the digital asset.
Lucas, a three-decade veteran of the Home, prides himself on being the longest-serving Republican on the Monetary Companies Committee. In an April assertion saying his bid, the Oklahoman wrote “I am well positioned and well equipped to lead the Committee,” citing his huge expertise on Capitol Hill.
Huizenga, the chair of the oversight and investigations subcommittee, has stated he desires to “put the economy back on its feet” and “put regulations in place properly rather than the willy-nilly that we’ve seen,” arguing that the chair must be “someone who’s going to be able to work with our colleagues in the Senate,” earlier than emphasizing his relationship with Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), who is anticipated to steer the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and City Affairs.
Overseas Affairs Committee
Outgoing Home Overseas Affairs Committee Chair Michael McCaul (R-Texas) declined to hunt a waiver to proceed main the committee, Axios first reported, establishing a four-way race between Reps. Brian Mast (R-Fla.), Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), Ann Wagner (R-Mo.), and Joe Wilson (R-S.C.).
Wagner, the vice chair of the committee, has touted her expertise within the overseas affairs sector, together with serving as U.S. ambassador to Luxembourg throughout former President George W. Bush’s administration and co-chair of the Abraham Accords Caucus, which was created to concentrate on supporting the Trump-era settlement normalizing relations between Israel and Arab States.
If given the gavel, Wagner is vowing to crack down on China and Iran, safe the border and work to “contain Russia’s recklessly dangerous expansion,” her spokesperson informed The Hill.
Issa, in the meantime, is positioning himself as one of the ready of the candidates to take the gavel of the Overseas Affairs panel, having visited greater than 100 international locations. He has additionally crafted private relationships with world leaders in allied international locations and in people who have a tougher relationship with the U.S.
Issa’s expertise chairing the Home Oversight and Accountability Committee can also be a promoting level. He helped put the panel on the map by means of investigations like Quick and Livid, and he helped empower future GOP stars and leaders by means of the panel’s work.
Wilson is pitching himself as an elder statesman within the race. He has led greater than 70 congressional delegation journeys to greater than 80 international locations throughout his time in Congress. And as he campaigns for the committee chair, he has been giving steering committee members items from the Berlin wall that he had introduced again from Germany in 1990.
Considered one of Wilson’s prime priorities is to work with President-elect Trump to codify Iran sanctions. He beforehand helped introduce the Most Strain Act.
Mast, in the meantime, got here to Congress in 2017 after serving within the U.S. Military for greater than 12 years, the place he earned a Purple Coronary heart, amongst different honors. The Florida Republican drew headlines final 12 months after, in a present of help for Israel, he wore to the Capitol his uniform for the Israeli navy, which he volunteered to serve alongside after his time within the Military.
Training and Workforce Committee
Outgoing Training and Workforce Chair Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) had gotten a waiver to stay in a single additional time period past the time period restrict on this Congress however is just not searching for to remain once more.
That has opened up a race between Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.), who ran in opposition to Foxx for the submit practically two years in the past, and Rep. Burgess Owens (R-Utah).
Walberg’s case is that he is likely one of the most senior members of the committee. Within the new Congress, his prime priorities would come with supporting mother and father’ rights, combating antisemitism and anti-Americanism on campus, and updating the Household Academic Rights and Privateness Act regulation.
The committee will play a task within the Home GOP’s partisan reconciliation payments they hope to push by means of Congress to Trump’s desk, attributable to plans to handle pupil mortgage points.
Owens, in the meantime, is operating on a platform that features faculty alternative, combating campus antisemitism and variety, fairness and inclusion initiatives within the classroom, and selling hiring practices that emphasize capabilities, with a watch in direction of the skills-based economic system.
Transportation and Infrastructure Committee
Present Chair Sam Graves (R-Mo.) is in his third time period within the prime GOP spot on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, however he obtained a waiver from the steering committee this week to hunt a fourth time period — coming after President-elect Trump opted to select former congressman and former Fox Information host Sean Duffy to be Transportation Secretary fairly than Graves.
However Rep. Rick Crawford (R-Ark.) can also be searching for the gavel for the highly effective panel.
Graves is pitching himself as an skilled legislator, touting his expertise ushering by means of the five-year Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization invoice that was signed into regulation earlier this 12 months. And trying to subsequent Congress, Graves hopes to make use of a five-year freeway reauthorization invoice as a car to assist Trump push his transportation priorities.
Crawford, in the meantime, has a coverage blueprint supplies that concentrate on investments within the most-used strategies of transportation. He argues that investments in “highways, railways, ports, and airways … cannot be subsumed by investments in ‘nice to have’ or ‘soft’ infrastructure projects” like “bike lanes, civilian traffic enforcement, wildlife crossings,” or different initiatives.
