McCarthy promises to remove three Dems from committee posts

Maxine Waters should also be removed

Kevin McCarthy has promised to remove three Democrats from their committee assignments. The three are Eric Swalwell, Adam Schiff, and Ilhan Omar.

In my view, the Speaker and his party should not be dictating which members of the opposing party serve on committees. However, Nancy Pelosi’s behavior as Speaker invites McCarthy’s response.

Pelosi set the precedent for excluding members of the opposition party from committees when her caucus voted to exclude Marjorie Taylor Greene and Paul Gosar. Later she excluded Jim Jordan and Jim Banks from the select committee investigating the events of January 6, 2021. Both had been chosen by McCarthy, who was exercising a prerogative that had always belonged to the leader of the opposition.

As a practical matter, then, the question isn’t so much whether McCarthy should exclude Democrats. The question is how far to take this and which Democrats to exclude.

In my opinion, the strongest candidate for exclusion is one McCarthy hasn’t identified and one I haven’t seen discussed elsewhere. In fact, I overlooked her until a reader/friend mentioned her to me.

She’s Maxine Waters.

Waters is a strong candidate because of the rationale Pelosi used to exclude Greene and Gosar. In both cases, the rationale was that statements the two made supposedly endangered one or more member of Congress.

But Waters advocated the harassment of members of Donald Trump’s Cabinet. “If you see anybody from that Cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd and you push back on them, and you tell them they're not welcome anymore, anywhere,” she instructed.

Waters wasn’t urging that crowds “push back” against members of Congress, but that shouldn’t matter. Urging mobs on against any public officials is unacceptable behavior for a member of Congress. Waters should receive the same treatment the Democrats handed out to Greene and Gosar.

Now let’s discuss the three Democratic members McCarthy has identified. Eric Swalwell should be removed and excluded from all committees connected with intelligence. The reason is obvious enough, I discussed it here.

What about Adam Schiff? McCarthy says Schiff has “lied to the American public time and again” and therefore “we will not allow him to be on the Intel Committee either.”

I agree that Schiff is a liar. However, he’s far from the only member of Congress about whom this can be said. Nor is the practice confined to Democrats. If accusations of dishonesty become a basis for purging opposition members from committees, how many members will be secure in their committee assignments?

In my opinion, the most problematic case for exclusion on McCarthy’s list is Ilhan Omar. McCarthy wants to boot her from the Foreign Relations Committee because of her anti-Israel views and her claims about Jewish influence over U.S. foreign policy, including these: “I want to talk about the political influence in this country that says it is okay to push for the allegiance to a foreign country” and “It’s all about the Benjamins baby.”

In my view, members of Congress should never be excluded from committee assignments because of their views on controversial matters. However, Pelosi’s exclusion of Jordan and Banks from the Jan. 6 committee provides precedent for removing Omar based on her opinions about (1) Israel, (2) the influence of American Jews on U.S. foreign policy, and (3) their motives. Indeed, Omar’s views can be characterized as anti-Semitic, and thus are more noxious than those of Jordan and Banks.

However, punishing members whose statements can be characterized as anti-Semitic opens the door to punishing members whose statements can be characterized as racist. And these days, the left-liberal definition of a racist statement is wide ranging. To avoid setting a precedent for excluding members who are labeled racist, I’d prefer that Omar keep her assignment

In addition, from a purely partisan perspective I don’t mind having Omer on the Foreign Relations Committee. The more she occupies the center stage in Congress, the worse it is for Democrats.

As a general matter, I believe the proper course for McCarthy is to find a response to the Democrats that more or less reciprocates Pelosi’s exclusionary decisions but does not set new precedent for future damage to the House as an institution (understanding, at the same time, that the Dems don’t need precedent to damage our institutions). Exactly where to locate that balance is subject to debate.