right now there’s a certain ruling party member who has taken it upon himself to be a “right pain in the ass” and seemingly obstructs everything they do in congress
What recourse do they have in punting him on his way and getting someone more agreeable to their agenda?
and what would be the fallout if they did manage to kick him out?
I assume (since you write “congress”) you mean the U.S.
You can’t kick someone out of a political party outright because the ability to affiliate with a party is considered a right granted with citizenship. In states with closed primaries party affiliation is a prerequisite for the right to vote in primary elections. It is generally not up to the party to control who registers in that party.
If you mean party leadership positions like House Minority Whip or Majority Leader, that can be changed with a caucus vote (a majority vote of all party members in that chamber of Congress).
~Max
American politics has a long history of politicians who have annoyed, embarrassed, or even enraged their parties, but somehow manage to please their constituents enough to keep getting elected.
The good old days where someone like Lyndon Johnson could and would make life miserable for a Congressperson or Senator who didn’t follow the party line are over. In the U.S. about the only recourse the party has is to provide or withdraw support during an election campaign. And for whatever reason, Republicans have proven to be more effective at purging outliers from their party than Democrats.
The party it self can’t unelect a candidate (who we’ll call Jack Mannequin for the sake of having a name). It can back a different candidate in a subsequent primary, denying funds and the party-level grass-roots organizing that the party-favored candidate receives, but that presumes that the party can find someone who they can promote with greater appeal than Mr. Mannequin. If the reality is that by splitting support for the ticket means that voters are lost to an opposing party, it may be better to keep Jack even if he is a massive pain in the ass because at least he is notionally aligned with the party and may be persuaded to support some particular initiatives rather than completely lose the seat to the opposition party, and in Mr. Mannequin’s purely hypothetical case it may be key to maintaining a majority in whichever house of legislature that he serves.
Stranger
Yeah, I’m pretty sure OP is referring to J.M.
~Max
Republicans are unified in their mission to sow fear, uncertainty, and doubt, and anyone who questions that agenda isn’t a True RepublicanTM, and probably not even an genuine American citizen. Democrats, on the other hand, can’t even manage to brush off a gadfly who only joins their party to run in a primary election and then immediately quits as soon as he loses, only to do the same then four years later. I’m not sure who is worse.
Stranger
The hypothetical renegade congresscritter could be female (call her Crystal Movietheater to give her a name)…
[Moderating]
A reminder that this is GQ, not P&E. The OP didn’t name any specific names or parties; that (or using made-up names like Mannequin) is a good way to keep the discussion neutral and factual.
The election of someone from the other party.
Apparently the people in this hypothetical congressperson’s state feel like they are representing them well. Who are you to infringe upon their choice for representation?
well he’d still be there but as an independent maybe ? i didnt say hed be removed from congress just the party
That’s an interesting point that had escaped me (as a foreigner somewhat puzzled by the way US parties operate).
It explains a lot: with us, parties are private organisations. Of course anyone has the right to their opinions and to join together with others to promote them, but like any such organisation, a party can set their own rules as to what’s expected of members, and consequent action on someone who won’t comply, up to and including expulsion from the party. They can and do have a system for prior vetting by the central party organisation of people who want to apply for nomination as a party candidate, to make sure they’re at least basically presentable in terms of personality, political sensibilities and attitudes.
But if someone has strong enough support to get themselves elected to office, all the party leadership/executive can do is refuse to let them participate in party activity or have any support from the party organisation. (As with all the argument over Jeremy Corbyn and his handling of anti-Semitism within his party).
One important aspect of party membership for an elected member is the responsibility to raise money for the party. I have read a few articles that describe a-day-in-the-life for a sitting US congressperson/senator and, if the reporting is accurate, they can spend up to 50% of their waking hours fundraising (breakfast meets, hours working the phones, dinner meets). This fundraising is for their own campaign coffers, and for party campaign coffers. As much as the greater party establishment may find a certain member to be coloring outside of the lines, if they are effective at getting elected, AND AT RAISING FUNDS, then I suspect the party will abide their shenanigans and not work on finding someone to oppose them in the next election.
I believe this can explain some of the more colorful characters on both sides of the aisle.
In Canada, and I assume the UK and similar systems, the individuals run in their constituency (riding). The ballot contains a spot for “party affiliation”. To have the party show up on the ballot, the head office for the party has to sign off on the candidate’s affiliation. While the candidate is nominally elected by the party members in the riding, this gives the central brass an effective veto - and sometimes the central office will twist arms or outright appoint someone as candidate if for example, they have a star candidate to promote (but overriding the local wishes carries its own risks sometimes). Just like in the USA, though, riding votes tend to lean toward certain party affiliations so the party endorsement can be important.
There have been numerous instances (including in yesterday’s election) where a candidate’s current or past actions of speech have resulted in the party denying or withdrawing affiliation. If this happens early enough, the party can nominate an alternative candidate, and the “guilty” candidate has the option to withdraw or run as an independent.
I would say as a rule of thumb, about half the votes in a riding are due to the local candidate, and half due to the party affiliation (i.e. support for the leader and overall policy). Generally, a person choosing to defy the party is effectively committing political suicide, saying “F*** you” to the party brass will be remembered long after the public forgets. Plus, the person is liable to split the party vote and result in the rival party winning - another “not good” mark against the person. And, in a parliamentary system, the cabinet and the prime minister are the result of the party winning the most seats - so political career is very much tied to being elected with the right party.
From what I read of the American system - the opposite. Candidacy and party affiliation come from primaries and grass roots. Plus, the legislative position carry their own weight - they don’t really lead to further positions like cabinet; about the only promotions available are to committee memberships. Local politics seems to carry a much heavier weight than in a parliamentary system, since the public can vote for leader from one party separate from their congressional or senate rep. The only blow from being “kicked out of caucus” is not getting to participate in strategy sessions. Even for things like modifying bills to add one’s particular pork - the US system is more a matter of “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” so once elected, an independent’s only disadvantges would be animosity of the other party/parties, and not having a group to push a particular issue. Both of these can be overcome by a particularly persuasive politician.
So there’s really no great disadvantage for the party disavowing affiliation. About the only thing the party can do is send someone else to run in a primary against a rogue member. This presumes the consituents also give a … hoot… about the issues in play.
This is also the failing of the American system, Primaries are low-turnout votes. As a result, the fanatical and dedicated - i.e. the more radical - can have a bigger effect of the results, and those with dedicated followers can have outsized influences. The more moderate as less interested.
Then there’s elephant (and donkey) in the room - money. Unlike the Canadian system, where spending by advocacy groups can be very limited, by law - the USA is wide open. Candidates tend to raise and spend a lot of their own money on very personal campaigns, rather than a centralized party campaign that tries to float all boats.
Steve King, the former congressman from Iowa, is a good case study for the Republican side. Before the 2020 election, he had been removed from all committee seats by the Republicans and Democrats. Then the Republican party refused to fund his campaign for re-election and backed another Republican in the primary. The competitor, Randy Feenstra, won the Republican primary and the final election.
Indeed, the situation is different in the US. If you say you’re a Republican, then you’re a Republican. If you say you’re a Democrat, then you’re a Democrat. It doesn’t matter what your opinions on the issues are, although you’ll probably do better if you’re in line with your party’s positions. The parties themselves have no control over who claims to be a member.
Presumably, though, at the different levels of party organisation there’s some sort of control over who sits on the committees and so on?
Even assuming that could be done, then the Senate would be 47 D, 50 R, and 3 I, 2 caucusing D and 1 caucusing R. More likely the individual in question would just have been handed a politically legitimate reason for changing parties (as opposed to flipping due to having lost a primary) and now there would be 51 Republican senators.
Liberal Democrats have to get used to the idea that the Democratic base doesn’t outnumber the Republican base. The Democratic coalition outnumbers them, but no single part of it does. That means compromise and living to fight another day in the 2022 and 2024 elections.
Liz Cheney would like to disagree with you.
Art Jones ran for the Republican primary slot in Congressional race IL-3 and won. He is a Nazi – not in the “I don’t like Republicans” sense but in the “Gives speeches for the National Socialist Movement, headed the American Nazi Party at one point and denies the Holocaust, etc” sense. The state GOP called him a Nazi.
They also said “Nothing we can do about it” when he won the Republican primary and was the GOP candidate for the House seat. A lot of noise about him not representing the GOP and being a terrible guy but no motion on ejecting him from the party, etc because I don’t think that’s something they could actually do.