Republicans in Problem Solvers Caucus voted with Trump 93% of time. Bipartisan? Not so much.

[suffragette]

Good article about Problem Solvers Caucus from shortly before midterm election.

Of note is that the supposedly bipartisan Republican members of the Caucus voted with Trump the vast majority of the time and that the Caucus created their plan to withhold support for votes for the Speaker and attempt to weaken the House Leadership role this past summer, a time when it was becoming clear that the House majority would likely shift to Democrats.

Pretty clear that their intent is to hamstring Democratic leadership and solid Democratic legislation.

As to the Democratic members of this Caucus, I’m starting to think of them as Lieberman’s Lemmings, since they are taking on his approach of supporting Republicans and Republican policy over the Democratic platform and majority purpose.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2018/11/05/house-problem-solvers-caucus-has-solved-few-problems-bipartisan-critics-allege/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.0c48e1e8ff2d

Democrats in particular say that by supporting the group, members of their own party have given political cover to lawmakers with conservative voting records without forcing those same lawmakers to take concrete action to stall Republican legislation on health care or taxes. The caucus’s Republican members have on average voted in line with the White House’s position 93 percent of the time, according to calculations based on FiveThirtyEight’s vote tracker, with at least nine Republicans in the group doing so more than 95 percent of the time.
~~~
The Problem Solvers also expressed faith in a set of proposed House rules changes they unveiled this summer to Break the Gridlock, vowing as a bloc to withhold their votes for any potential House speaker who did not agree to adopt the rules. The rule changes would weaken House leadership’s control over which bills get a vote, forcing to the floor bills co-sponsored by more than 290 members.

[UTUSN]

1. K&R - plus this definitive article what they're about from TruthDig (via DUer Rainy) :

**********QUOTE*********

https://www.truthdig.com/articles/whos-really-leading-the-democratic-rebellion-against-pelosi/

Who's Really Leading the Democratic Rebellion Against Pelosi?

.... ... ideology is not driving this campaign, and this is no populist rebellion. In fact, its leaders have no discernible ideology at all.
That’s how corporate money rolls in the Democratic Party. It lays low, hides its true colors, and pretends it only wants to “get things done.”

The anti-Pelosi insurgency is not a movement. It’s a cabal, orchestrated by the appropriately hashtagged #FiveWhiteGuys, a group of self-self-interested players with big money behind them. ....

...vague on the issues, big on cliches and platitudes, ... is the hallmark of “centrism,” the billionaire-funded political faction that serves its financial backers by selling themselves as “non-ideological,” “technocratic” architects of “bipartisan” consensus who can “break the gridlock” and “solve problems.”

For this crowd, “solving problems” always winds up meaning the same thing: cuts to Social Security and Medicare, and an unwarranted obsession with the federal deficit that always—just accidentally, mind you!—winds up helping corporations and the billionaire class. ....

...claims to be “above parties and partisanship”—which, in the end, is another way of saying it’s free of any principles except the interests of its paymasters. It often comes in the guise of patriotism, as when Seth Moulton says he places “country over party”—a comment that, implicitly, is a deep insult to those who believe one party’s proposals would serve the country better than the other’s.

The anti-Pelosi campaign is being supported by one of the mainstays of the corporate centrist world—the cynical political ploy known as “No Labels,” which I wrote about in 2012, and its creation, the “Problem Solvers Caucus.” ... a guaranteed-employment plan for Republican and Democratic political hacks, ... ....

**********UNQUOTE********

[suffragette]

4. Great article. Putting the two together, "Break the Gridlock" means diminish Democratic Speaker's

role and power, since they used that term as defining their plan to do just that.

Where was “Break the Gridlock” when Obama’s nomination for Supreme Court was held up and undermined?

[Autumn]

7. Rolling over somewhere?

[suffragette]

10. Or trying to find a euphemism for "privatize" to talk about plans to "fix" Social Security.

[lilactime]

2. K&R

[suffragette]

11. Thank you!

[Baitball Blogger]

3. Can we dismantle the committee?

[suffragette]

9. Since it's a Caucus rather than a committee, it would be self-selecting.

[ProudLib72]

5. Well, there goes that "progressive" talking point

Lieberman's Lemmings are a bunch of no good shit stirrers. They ought to be recognized as such.

[suffragette]

15. Exactly. Lieberman's Lemmings are trying to roadblock progressives' actions and legislation in

alliance with Republicans, just like Lieberman has done before.

[ProudLib72]

21. You know, when I was living in CT I started out liking Lieberman

It took me a little while, but I figured him out in the end. I think a good word to use is "duplicitous".

[suffragette]

24. Duplicitous certainly fits, both him and his Lemmings.

[Autumn]

6. It's the WP and I can't read it. Who are these wondrous Problem Solvers Caucus

members that are so eager to throw away our House win and make sure Republicans have a say in what we do?

[suffragette]

8. This article names more of the Republicans in that Caucus than Democrats, likely since it was

written before they kicked their summer-hatched plan into high gear this last week.

Here are the ones it names:

Rep. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.) co-chair
Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.)
Lloyd Smucker (R-Pa.)
John Katko (R-N.Y.)


Ami Bera (D-Calif.)
Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) co-chair
Daniel Lipinski (D-Ill.)

[Hortensis]

14. Here's some more from that article, Autumn.

Author Jeff Stein in the business section.

The House of Representatives has a bipartisan group of 48 members called the Problem Solvers Caucus, and Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) says he’s taking every opportunity to let you know he is one of them. ...

“It seems to be used right now mostly for political and campaign purposes,” said Andrew Grant, a Republican challenging Rep. Ami Bera (D-Calif.) in California’s 7th Congressional District. Bera is a member of the Problem Solvers Caucus who was ranked among the bottom third for bipartisanship in the House by the Lugar Center, a nonpartisan think tank. Mr. Bera was reelected. Grant said months ago he called friends who work as Republican staffers in the Capitol to ask about the Problem Solvers. “Everyone I talked to said, ‘This group has done almost nothing,’ ” Grant said.

Rep. Lloyd Smucker (R-Pa.), who has voted in line with President Trump about 96 percent of the time, has mentioned his involvement in the Problem Solvers group in every debate. More than 110 House Republicans — nearly half the caucus — have more bipartisan voting records than Smucker, according to the Lugar Center. “[Smucker] can use it to say, ‘Look, I’m working across the aisle,’ even though he is 100 percent in line with Donald Trump, doesn’t hold any moderate positions and takes a ton of corporate money,” Jess King, his Democratic opponent, said of the Problem Solvers group. “People truly don’t understand what it’s all about, and it keeps coming up.”

Rep. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.), who has voted with Trump about 97 percent of the time, is the Republican co-chair of the caucus and uses it as his “number one talking point — like it’s obsessive, all the time; all the time,” said Tracy Mitrano, his Democratic opponent. The Buffalo News, in endorsing Reed, cited his work in the Problem Solvers as a key justification, as did the York Daily Record in Pennsylvania when endorsing Smucker. Smucker and Reed both voted for the plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and they voted for Trump’s tax law last fall, two highly contentious and overwhelmingly partisan votes. Although they have more moderate voting records than the bulk of their caucus, many Republicans in the Problem Solvers caucus supported both efforts. ...

No Labels and its affiliated super PACs have thrown millions of dollars into the 2018 elections on behalf of Problem Solvers candidates, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a money-in-politics watchdog. A group tied to No Labels spent about $1 million helping Rep. Daniel Lipinski (D-Ill.), a member of the Problem Solvers Caucus, fend off a left-wing challenger in a district often regarded as more liberal than Lipinski. ...“They are just roadkill in the legislative process,” Jim Manley, who was an aide to former Senate majority leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.), said of the Problem Solvers. “Their track record is nonexistent,” said Rep. Raúl M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.), a liberal member of Congress. “It’s more of a political cover operation than real legislative operation — there’s no policy product.” ...

Thanks for posting this, Suffragette. I missed it.

[Autumn]

16. Thanks for that. The last line as far as I'm concerned says it all.

“It’s more of a political cover operation than real legislative operation — there’s no policy product.” ...

[Hortensis]

17. Yes. Me too.

And this "rules change" attack explains what it's providing cover for right now.

[suffragette]

18. Glad you posted more. That part about Lipinski's funding and not being as liberal as his district

is very interesting.

Isn’t he one of the nine this group has put forward against Pelosi?

And i’m using “put forward” on purpose here, since it looks like the whole group, including the Republicans, took part in that summer planning.

I think Grijalva nailed it in terming them a “political cover operation.”

[Hortensis]

20. The Hill does list Lipinski as one of the 9, Suffragette.

Their attempt to cover their main agendas, including attack the woman, probably isn't going as planned as they're getting a lot of the wrong kind of publicity here.

We have a rules committee that isn't mentioned in any of this, so guess Nancy's playing her usual lightning rod "attract-and-diffuse-harmlessly into-the-ground" role. We've already been planning our own major rules overhaul, of course, repairing much of what the Republicans have done. Rep. Jim McGovern, previous ranking member, will replace Pete Sessions as chair.

Although Nancy, and supposedly McGovern, met with them last week (the article was as of 10/23, so that'd be the week before last), they haven't provided these poseurs an answer on which of their demands the committee might be open to.

The Democrats who signed onto the statement are Reps. Josh Gottheimer (N.J.), Jim Costa (Calif.), Tom O'Halleran (Ariz.), Kurt Schrader (Ore.), Tom Suozzi (N.Y.), Daniel Lipinski (Ill.), Stephanie Murphy (Fla.), Vicente González (Texas) and Darren Soto (Fla.). Schrader was also among 15 other Democrats who earlier promised to vote against Pelosi on the House floor. Together, the groups could have the numbers to block her ascension.

They're not all older white men, just mostly, and do average out with less than a full head of gray/white hair. Rep. Murphy is Vietnamese American.

[suffragette]

22. Very important point about having our own rules committee now. Yet another example of this Caucus

trying to undercut decision making now that the Democrats will have control of the committee.

The more I know about this, the more vile it is.

And LOVE your last comment, especially the italicized part. So apt.

[Blue_true]

12. Several people have pointed out that the "Problem Solving Caucus" is phony.

If it was not, Paul Ryan would have lost on some bills that passes the House with uniform democratic opposition. If it was not, 1-3 pieces of legislation that had broad democratic support would have been put up for a floor vote via a discharge petition procedure.

Forget this problem solving BS, it is all about republicans trying to prevent majority democrats from voting on legistlation that the majority of voters have said that they wanted.

[suffragette]

19. Exactly so. And extremely important that they be exposed for what they are trying to do.

[pwb]

13. All these phony caucuses and groups had a following here.

Some surprised me. It was disheartening.

[suffragette]

23. That is disheartening.