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House Republicans, divided and demoralized after the ouster of their speaker this week, are now quietly feuding over how to elect a successor.

The dispute, which erupted on Friday, suggests that the same divisions that led to the downfall of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy are continuing to fester inside the G.O.P. ranks, setting the stage for a potentially bruising contest next week when lawmakers were set to meet to elect his replacement.

At issue is a request made by more than 90 House Republicans on Friday to temporarily change the partys internal rules for nominating a candidate for speaker. In a brief letter to Representative Patrick T. McHenry of North Carolina, the interim speaker, and Representative Elise Stefanik of New York, the conference chair, the group requested a special organizational meeting to consider the change. The New York Times obtained a copy of the letter.

In the letter, they asked for an amendment to temporarily raise the threshold to become the nominee. Proponents of the change have been pushing to require a unanimous vote of the Republican conference, instead of the current bar of a majority.

They have presented the idea as a way to foster unity after the deeply divisive ouster of Mr. McCarthy at the hands of eight, mostly right-wing rebels who went against the rest of their Republican colleagues this week.

It would, in theory, avoid a replay of the public chaos that unfolded in January, when the nation watched as the House slogged through 15 rounds of roll call votes until Republicans finally coalesced around Mr. McCarthy, a veteran lawmaker from California.

But supporters of Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the majority leader who is running for speaker, quickly cried foul, arguing that the change would only make it more difficult for him to be elected.

The idea that the fractured G.O.P. conference could unanimously come together behind either Mr. Scalise or the other declared candidate, Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, is also virtually unthinkable.

But Mr. Scalises allies believe that he would win a majority over Mr. Jordan, putting him in a strong position to beat the Ohio Republican on the House floor under the current rules.

Changing the rules is going to create chaos and only advantages candidates who cant get to 51 percent in the closed-door vote, said Representative Lance Gooden of Texas, who has said he is backing Mr. Scalise.

Representative Ann Wagner of Missouri, who is also backing Mr. Scalise, said that a last-minute, rushed rule change is really not what the conference needs right now.

We need unity and we need leadership, she said. We should all be prepared to support the nominee who the majority chooses.

She added that there was nothing binding about a conference meeting vote. The only vote that is binding is done in full transparency on the floor of the House of Representatives, she said.

House Republicans were scheduled to meet behind closed doors on Tuesday to nominate a new candidate for speaker by secret ballot, and a floor vote could take place as early as the next day.

Under the current Republican conference rules, whoever emerges from the secret ballot with a simple majority of votes wins. Changing the rules could lead to a much more drawn-out process wherein both candidates would have to battle to get the entire conference behind them.

Mr. Scalises allies regard the effort as a bid by those who are boosting Mr. Jordans candidacy to tilt the scales in his favor. One of the people leading the charge for the change was Representative Chip Roy of Texas, who has endorsed Mr. Jordan.

Mr. McCarthys allies have also been pressing members to sign on, arguing that the rule change would help keep any infighting behind closed doors. The former speaker has long had a rocky and competitive relationship with Mr. Scalise. And the sense among Mr. Scalises backers is that they have a vested interest in helping to elect Mr. Jordan as speaker.

The members who signed the letter come from all factions of the Republican conference. They included Representative Garret Graves of Louisiana, a loyal McCarthy ally, and Representative Bob Good of Virginia, one of the eight hard-right members who voted to oust him.

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Days Before a Vote, Republicans Feud Over How to Choose a New ... - The New York Times

Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., appears before the House Rules Committee at the Capitol in Washington on Sept. 22. Gaetz introduced a Motion to Vacate House Speaker Kevin McCarthy that led to the first ouster of a sitting Speaker in American history. J. Scott Applewhite/AP hide caption

Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., appears before the House Rules Committee at the Capitol in Washington on Sept. 22. Gaetz introduced a Motion to Vacate House Speaker Kevin McCarthy that led to the first ouster of a sitting Speaker in American history.

With the historic vote in the House of Representatives that removed Speaker Kevin McCarthy from his post atop the chamber, one particular Republican rose to national attention for his role as Congressional disruptor: Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida

After leading the group of hardline Republicans who fought against funding the government and blasted McCarthy for the deal he did to avert a government shutdown, Gaetz delivered a Motion to Vacate, the procedural resolution that can remove a speaker from that position.

But even after the vote and amid searing critique from his fellow Republicans, Gaetz remained defiant.

"I think that this represents the ripping off of the band-aid and that's what we have to do to get back on track," he told reporters in front of the Capitol shortly after Tuesday's vote.

That's a position that is not widely shared in his party, but in his congressional district in northwest Florida, it's a completely different story.

In this file photo, former Florida state Sen. Don Gaetz, R, left, hugs his son, former state Rep. Matt Gaetz, R, after he was sworn in as the newest member of the house on April 15, 2010, in Tallahassee, Fla. Steve Cannon/ASSOCIATED PRESS hide caption

In this file photo, former Florida state Sen. Don Gaetz, R, left, hugs his son, former state Rep. Matt Gaetz, R, after he was sworn in as the newest member of the house on April 15, 2010, in Tallahassee, Fla.

Matt Gaetz has been making political waves in Florida for a long time. The son of Florida's former Senate President, he was first elected to Florida's legislature 13 years ago at 31. Then, in 2016, he ran for - and won - a congressional seat.

Even before that though, he was cementing himself as a self-described 'firebrand,' also the title of his 2020 autobiography.

The chair of Florida's Democratic Party, Nikki Fried, remembers a young, high-school student already stirring things up. As a college student, she helped run a debate tournament that Gaetz appeared in.

"And he was actually kicked out of our student Congress for being disrespectful, disruptive, getting his way or the highway," she recalled. "So unfortunately, these are the patterns of who Matt Gaetz is."

After publication, a spokesperson for Gaetz disputed Fried's account, saying she is wrong and Gaetz has never competed in a student Congress event, nor has he been kicked out of a competition.

When reached for reaction, Fried stood by her story.

Regardless of how he presented himself early in the formation of his political identity, his constituents don't seem to mind the role he plays now. Gaetz's Congressional district on Florida's panhandle is one of the most Republican in the state. He easily won reelection every term since first going to Congress. Still, some conservative Republicans in his district, like Renee Johnmeyer say they began to think Gaetz was all talk and no action.

"I felt like it was a lot of word service," Johnmeyer recalled of her congressman's tenure in Congress, "that he was just saying things and not making things happen."

Johnmeyer is active in the Santa Rosa County Republican Party, right in the heart of Gaetz's district. At a local restaurant for a club meeting, she expressed skepticism about him, but said his actions this week have won him a lot of goodwill with her.

"To see him actually step up and out and do something that will move the party in a different direction, I was happy to see that," she said.

That was a sentiment echoed throughout the meeting.

"Before this happened I had mixed feelings," Sharon Hawthorne, another local Republican Party member, explained of Gaetz. "I liked some things that he did. I didn't like other things he did. But I love the fact that he took this stand for us."

"And I feel like this is the best thing that could have happened for Republicans, for Democrats and for America," Hawthorne said.

Gaetz is no stranger to national media attention, though he often made headlines as more of a troll on Democrats, like when he wore a full gas mask on the floor of the House during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and Democrats' public health measures.

Gaetz also led an attempted breach on the secure facility where impeachment proceedings took place against former president Donald Trump during his first impeachment.

That changed at the beginning of the 118th Congress when Gaetz stood in opposition to Kevin McCarthy in his initial bid for the speakership. Ultimately, McCarthy stood through 15 rounds of voting before receiving enough votes to become speaker. Gaetz did not vote for him once.

An ally and supporter of Trump's, Gaetz firmly aligned himself with the former president during his time in office and has remained by his side since.

According to Adam Cayton, a political scientist at the University of West Florida, that style of politics plays well in today's GOP.

"[Gaetz is] combative, bombastic, conservative, doesn't shy away from very public conflict," Cayton explained. "So, he's tapping into the same strain of feeling that is propelling Donald Trump to the leadership of the Republican party."

In this Oct. 2019, file photo President Donald Trump, right, accompanied by Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., left, arrive for Game 5 of the World Series baseball game between the Houston Astros and the Washington Nationals at Nationals Park in Washington. Andrew Harnik/AP hide caption

In this Oct. 2019, file photo President Donald Trump, right, accompanied by Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., left, arrive for Game 5 of the World Series baseball game between the Houston Astros and the Washington Nationals at Nationals Park in Washington.

Still, back home, Gaetz's constituents who cheered on his actions aren't sure it will actually pay off for him - or for them.

"It might be a risk for him. I'm glad he did it. In my view, the more Congress doesn't do anything, the better off Americans are," Patty Burke said. She's been local in GOP politics for more than 20 years and has followed Gaetz's career.

But, she's worried the Republican Party might now be seen as a party in disarray. Another Republican at the Santa Rosa County meeting, George Oedsma is less worried about his own party and more worried about the control Democrats still have in Washington.

"Republicans over many, many years, we're always told we have to compromise. But whenever we do, we get nothing and they get everything they want," Oedsma said. "It just seems like that over and over and over again."

As for whether Gaetz's actions will pay off?

"Ask me in a year from now and I might be able to tell you," he said.

Gaetz did not take McCarthy down with the intent of taking the job. He has made it clear that he has no interest in being speaker. It is unlikely he would have the votes to take the job as the polarizing figure in his party that he has become.

The House will need to choose its new leader before it can do any additional legislative business. But even with the 45-day continuing resolution to give Congress more time to fund the government, a potential shutdown is again, just around the corner.

Gaetz is unlikely to waver from his position on a conservative approach to funding the government. The first congressional district in Florida has more federal employees than any other district in the state and is home to a number of military installations, accounting for even more federal spending.

For retired Marine Stan Jandura, also attending the Santa Rosa County Republican Party meeting, that should not even be a consideration. He supports Gaetz's tactics on government spending and on ousting McCarthy.

"It's a colloquial term shutdown. It's not a real shutdown," Jandura said. "Government employees are still going to get their check once it opens back up. So, who does it hurt? It hurts the political party that is up there."

As for what Gaetz might do with his newfound notoriety, he is unlikely to face opposition at home in his heavily-Republican district, nor will he likely face a primary challenger as a moderate Republican would probably not fare as well.

There has been speculation that Gaetz might be eyeing the governor's mansion in Tallahassee, Fla., though he has said he has "no plans" to run for governor. Still, that election would not be until 2026 and there is precedent for a Gaetz-like candidate performing well statewide.

"It's worth remembering that our recent Governor was a Tea Party affiliated rightwing Republican with an anti-establishment brand," Adam Cayton, the political scientist at the University of West Florida said, speaking of current Gov. Ron DeSantis, a former three-term congressman.

For now, though, Gaetz seems laser focused on changing Congress. Because as he tweeted recently, "I know who I work for, and it's not the people in Washington D.C."

"It is the Americans who elected me to change Congress for the better," Gaetz said.

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Matt Gaetz ousted Speaker Kevin McCarthy and his voters in Florida ... - NPR

As a co-founder of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, Representative Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio, once antagonized his partys leadership so mercilessly that former Speaker John A. Boehner, whom he helped chase from his position, branded him a legislative terrorist.

Less than a decade later, Mr. Jordan a fast-talking Republican often seen sans jacket, known for his hard-line stances and aggressive tactics is now one of two leading candidates to claim the very speakership whose occupants he once tormented.

Mr. Jordans journey from the fringe of Republican politics to its epicenter on Capitol Hill is a testament to how sharply his party has veered to the right in recent years, and how thoroughly it has adopted his pugilistic style.

Those forces played a pivotal role in the downfall of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy this past week, though Mr. Jordan, once a thorn in his side, had since allied himself with Mr. McCarthy, a California Republican. Now, the same dynamics have placed Mr. Jordan in contention for the post that is second in line to the presidency, a notion that is mind-blowing to many establishment Republicans who have tracked his career.

That notion that he could go from legislative terrorist to speaker of the House is just insane, said Mike Ricci, a former aide to both Mr. Boehner and Speaker Paul D. Ryan, Republican of Wisconsin. Jordan is an outsider, but hes very much done the work of an insider to get to this moment. Keeping that balance is what will determine whether he will win, and what kind of speaker he will be.

The race between Mr. Jordan, a populist who questions federal law enforcement and Americas funding of overseas wars, and Representative Steve Scalise, a staunch conservative and the No. 2 House Republican from Louisiana, continued to heat up on Friday. Both men worked the phones relentlessly seeking support, including making calls with freshman lawmakers, the Congressional Western Caucus and the Main Street Caucus, a group of business-oriented Republicans.

On Friday, as they were vying for support, a bloc of Republicans were quietly requesting a change to party rules that would raise the vote threshold for nominating a candidate for speaker, which would make it more difficult for Mr. Scalise to prevail.

While Mr. Scalise is amassing dozens of commitments of support, so is Mr. Jordan, which could lead to a bitter and potentially prolonged battle when Republicans meet behind closed doors this coming week to choose their nominee or spill into public disarray on the House floor.

On Saturday, a third possible contender, Representative Kevin Hern of Oklahoma, said he would not run and urged his Republican colleagues to unify behind either Mr. Scalise or Mr. Jordan.

Mr. Jordans rise in Congress to a position where he can credibly challenge Mr. Scalise, who has served in leadership for years, stems from a number of important alliances he has formed over the years. His strongest base of power is his colleagues in the House Freedom Caucus, many of whom consider him a mentor. He has built a solid relationship with Mr. McCarthy, for whom Mr. Jordan proved a reliable supporter and important validator on the right. And he has forged close ties with former President Donald J. Trump, perhaps his most important ally.

In a Republican House that has defined itself in large part by its determination to protect Mr. Trump and attack President Biden, Mr. Jordan has been a leader of both efforts. He leads a special subcommittee on the weaponization of government against conservatives. He has started investigations into federal and state prosecutors who indicted Mr. Trump, and he is a co-leader of the impeachment inquiry into Mr. Biden that Mr. McCarthy formally announced last month as he worked to appease the right and cling to his post. The weaponization subcommittee has spotlighted some examples of government overreach and the impeachment inquiry has produced unflattering information against President Bidens son Hunter, but neither has produced proof of Republicans boldest claims.

Mr. Trump endorsed Mr. Jordan for the top House job early on Friday, ending speculation, however unrealistic, that the former president might seek the job himself. (A speaker is not required to be an elected lawmaker.)

Congressman Jim Jordan has been a STAR long before making his very successful journey to Washington, D.C., Mr. Trump wrote in a post on his social media platform, Truth Social. He will be a GREAT Speaker of the House, & has my Complete & Total Endorsement!

Mr. Trumps endorsement could help Mr. Jordan garner support from his other fellow House Republicans, among whom Mr. Trump is popular. But it is not expected to seal a victory.

Representative Warren Davidson, an Ohio Republican who is the whip of the House Freedom Caucus and a supporter of Mr. Jordan, said Mr. Trumps endorsement was a positive for Mr. Jordan because Trump is widely viewed as the leader of our party.

But, he said, some more mainstream Republicans arent thrilled about aligning themselves with Mr. Trump.

There are some folks in moderate districts that are like, Well, that might actually complicate things for me, Mr. Davidson said.

Mr. Jordan helped undermine faith in the 2020 presidential election results as Mr. Trump spread the lie that the election had been stolen through widespread fraud. Mr. Jordan strategized with Mr. Trump about how to use Congresss official count of electoral votes on Jan. 6, 2021, to reject the results, voting to object even after a mob of Mr. Trumps supporters attacked the Capitol. His candidacy for speaker has drawn a stark warning from former Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, who was the No. 3 Republican and vice chair of the Jan. 6 committee, who said that if he prevailed, there would no longer be any possible way to argue that a group of elected Republicans could be counted on to defend the Constitution.

In a speech at the University of Minnesota on Wednesday, Ms. Cheney told the audience that Jim Jordan was involved, was part of the conspiracy in which Donald Trump was engaged as he attempted to overturn the election.

Mr. Jordan has defended his actions in challenging the results of the 2020 election, saying he had a duty to object given the way some states changed voting procedures during the coronavirus pandemic.

His quick rise in the Republican ranks was nearly derailed in 2018, when a sexual abuse scandal in Ohio State Universitys athletics program came to light, leading to accusations that Mr. Jordan, who had been an assistant wrestling coach at the time, knew about the abuse and did nothing. Mr. Jordan has said that he was not aware of any wrongdoing.

On Capitol Hill, Mr. Jordan initially worked to build some relationships with Democrats early in his career. He and Representative Jamie Raskin, Democrat of Maryland, once teamed up on bipartisan legislation to protect press freedom. He counts former Representative Dennis Kucinich, a Democrat from Ohio who is now running Robert F. Kennedy Jr.s presidential campaign, as a friend. Even as Mr. Jordan and Representative Elijah Cummings, the Maryland Democrat who died in 2019, sparred over investigations of Mr. Trump, the two men occasionally found common ground on other Oversight Committee issues.

But as Mr. Jordan formed an alliance with Mr. Trump and then became one of his most vocal defenders on Capitol Hill, his relationships with Democrats disintegrated. When Mr. Raskin introduced his press freedom bill this year, Mr. Jordan was no longer listed as a sponsor.

Representative Jim Banks, Republican of Indiana, said that Mr. Jordans true power lay in the love he commands from base voters, built up through years of defending Mr. Trump and advocating conservative policies on Fox News and in combative congressional hearings. Mr. Jordan is known to fly to districts around the country to help raise money for candidates who are aligned with the House Freedom Caucus and even for Republicans who are not.

Mr. Banks suggested that Mr. Jordans credibility with the right could make it easier for the party to unify behind any spending deal he were to cut with Democrats and the White House should he become speaker. Such a deal would be a tall order. Mr. Jordan voted a week ago against a measure to avoid a government shutdown an agreement with Democrats that ultimately drove Mr. McCarthy from the speakership.

Jim Jordan is a trusted conservative; hes well-respected by the base of the Republican Party, Mr. Banks said. So when we get to some of these tough spending fights and Speaker Jim Jordan is negotiating with the White House and the Senate, thats going to help Republicans rally behind him and get to a place where they can vote for those deals.

This is a different Republican Party today than what it was a decade ago, he added. And the Republican Party today is a lot more like Jim Jordan. Its more of a fighting Republican Party.

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From the Fringe to the Center of the G.O.P., Jordan Remains a Hard ... - The New York Times

Consider method first: For its operation, the Constitutions design presumes legislators who prize national interest over what James Madison called factious, local interest. Madison thought that national elections would refine and enlarge the quality of national representations in comparison to their local peers. To us, this seems optimistic at best. But politicians are not just the sum of the structural forces acting on them (gerrymandering, dark money, etc.). They have agency, and can make choices. Those on the hard right who precipitated McCarthys fall demonstrated an unblinking zealotry and contempt for their colleagues within and beyond the party in ways that exemplify the spirit Madison repudiated. It is a spirit, as McCarthy himself acknowledged in his resignation speech, sharply at odds with the Constitutions design.

And what of aims? The Framers conducted a Revolution in favor of government, to quote the historian Max Edling. They built a government that would work. While the outer contours of federal power have long been contested, the core aim of the Constitution to create a working state to meet the international and economic challenges of the day was never in doubt. Advocates of the hard-right project today deeply misunderstand the Framers here. In effect, they ignore the first four aims listed in the Constitution in favor of an emphasis on Liberty (for the select, right-thinking few, at least). Such selectivity is, in its own way, another profound repudiation of the Constitutions core.

Bill Scher is a contributing writer to Politico Magazine, the politics editor for the Washington Monthly and co-host of The DMZ, an online show and podcast with conservative writer Matt Lewis.

The problem is too many people think American politics is more broken than it is in reality.

In the past three years, broad coalitions have formed to invest in infrastructure, enhance gun safety, support semiconductor manufacturing, aid Ukraine and even shore up the finances of the United States Postal Service.

When Republicans took over the House and far-right nihilists agitated for an economically devastating default on the federal governments debt obligations, a robust bipartisan majority embraced the budget deal that averted a crisis. Just last week, despite lingering disagreements about spending levels, border security and Ukraine, a similar bipartisan coalition made sure the federal government would not shut down.

And yet, a small number of Republican ideologues and gadflies refused to accept that now-former Speaker Kevin McCarthy had restrained spending as much as politically possible. Meanwhile, as they watched McCarthy strain to maintain Republican unity, House Democrats did not trust him to stick with the spending levels set in the debt limit deal, or continue to keep the government open. The speakers chair is vacant because of the mistrust and misaligned expectations of these two groups.

Finding common ground in an evenly divided country will always be challenging. But leaders in both parties have been picking their spots and finding pathways to success. American politics wasnt broken. Until Tuesday.

Norman Ornstein is an emeritus scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.

It has been clear for some years that what is broken in American politics is the Republican Party. The roots go back for decades starting with Newt Gingrichs arrival in the House in 1979. But the current chaos was triggered, ironically, by the self-proclaimed Young Guns Paul Ryan, Eric Cantor and Kevin McCarthy when they went around the country in 2009 recruiting tea party radicals, exploiting their anger after the financial collapse and the backlash against Barack Obama, promising to blow up the establishment in Washington with the hopes that they could use that anger to catapult themselves into the majority. Their expectation was that once these tea party radicals were in the House, they could co-opt them. Instead, of course, they were co-opted. John Boehner was the first victim of the Young Guns, but now all three of the Guns have been shot down by their own gang. Cantor lost his seat to a tea party radical; Ryan suffered the same fate as speaker as John Boehner, forced to leave by the radical right. And now McCarthy, the last one standing, has been taken out by the same forces in an even more dramatic manner.

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'What Is Broken in American Politics Is the Republican Party' - POLITICO

Orion Donovan Smith / The Spokesman-Review (TNS)

WASHINGTON When House Republicans brought Congress within hours of a government shutdown at the end of September and when a handful of those GOP lawmakers succeeded in ousting Kevin McCarthy as speaker days later they cited the same motive: reducing a federal budget deficit that has pushed the nation's debt above $33 trillion.

Many Democrats agree that the deficit the annual amount the government spends above revenue from taxes and other sources is a problem. But in an era of intense partisan division, optimism that the parties can work together to solve it is in short supply.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projects the deficit will average $2 trillion a year over the next decade.

"It's a mind-boggling number, and one that will take decades of concerted work by Congress to get down to more healthy levels," said Andrew Lautz, a senior policy analyst at the Bipartisan Policy Center, a think tank dedicated to forging consensus between Republicans and Democrats. "And of course, we're not seeing that level of bipartisan interest and cooperation in Congress."

In an interview Sept. 29, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Spokane, voiced the perspective of most Republicans at the Capitol, who favor cuts to federal spending and oppose any tax increases.

"Part of the reason that we find ourselves in this situation is because of continuing to spend and add to the debt," McMorris Rodgers said, referring to a potential shutdown that looms again in mid-November. "We need to address the spending and the debt in this nation."

Rep. Pramila Jayapal, who leads the Congressional Progressive Caucus, takes the opposite view. In an interview Sept. 19, the Seattle Democrat resisted the idea that the deficit is a problem and said Congress should be spending more on social programs while raising taxes on large corporations and the ultra-wealthy to increase revenue.

"We should actually be increasing our spending on the investment side," Jayapal said, arguing that spending on things like health care and child care would improve lives and spur economic growth that could strengthen the economy in the long run. "I would be happy to talk about the deficit, as long as we're talking about the revenue side."

More moderate Democrats say they are concerned about the deficit and debt, while pointing out that Republicans have been willing to run up deficits to finance tax cuts, suggesting GOP hand-wringing about the debt is less than sincere or at least takes a back seat to political expediency when Republicans are in power.

"We need to bring down the deficit, especially in times when we are economically doing well, but I think that it happens with a responsible balance of revenue and spending changes," Rep. Kim Schrier, D-Sammamish, said Sept. 19.

Schrier pointed out that Republicans want to renew the 2017 tax cuts they passed in the first year of Donald Trump's presidency, which included tax relief for corporations and the wealthiest Americans. The Congressional Budget Office, projects that renewing those cuts when they expire in 2025 would increase deficits by $3.5 trillion.

"That really belies this notion that it's the deficit they're worried about," Schrier said of Republicans.

Another problem, Lautz said, is that the perennial budget fights in Congress focus on just a fraction of the government's total spending. In fiscal year 2022, a little more than a quarter of the budget went to discretionary spending, which lawmakers must approve each year through the appropriations process. Nearly half of that spending is on defense, which has increased each year since 2015 without much opposition from either party.

"Nobody's concerned about the deficit when it comes to spending even more on the Pentagon," Jayapal said. "I just think that the way that we talk about the deficit is completely backwards, and what we need to do is think about investment in people. And then if we want to raise revenue, think about making the tax system fairer."

Roughly two-thirds of the budget is dedicated to mandatory spending on programs such as Social Security and Medicare, which is essentially on autopilot unless Congress acts to change course. That means the noisy spending fights that routinely threaten government shutdowns revolve around small portions of the budget that couldn't solve the debt problem on their own.

The U.S. government has borrowed money since its inception and regularly incurs more debt by selling securities through the Treasury. About two-thirds of that debt is held by people and institutions in the United States, with the Federal Reserve accounting for the biggest chunk, according to Treasury Department data. The other third is held by foreign creditors, led by Japan.

Ryan Herzog, an associate professor of economics at Gonzaga University, said it's important to understand that not all debt is bad. Like a household, borrowing money can allow the government to make investments that pay off in the long run.

But while politicians often compare the nation's debt to a household budget, Herzog said that analogy only goes so far. While people typically earn money in the middle of their lives to save for retirement, that's not the case with a government.

"The government lives forever at least we hope it does so it's not like your typical household budget," he said. "It's OK to have debt. We need to just be mindful of what that debt is, and the cost of carrying that over a long period of time."

More important than the total debt number, Herzog said, is the ratio of debt to income, measured by the country's gross domestic product. By that metric, the debt peaked at 133% of GDP in 2020, when the Trump administration borrowed huge sums for pandemic relief programs, but debt is still about 119% of GDP today, according to Federal Reserve data.

At the turn of the 21st century, the U.S. government actually had a budget surplus, but a series of events and policy decisions starting in 2001 changed that trajectory. The 9/11 terror attacks spurred a major increase in spending on the military, which the administration of President George W. Bush funded by borrowing money while cutting taxes. The Bush-era tax cuts were extended under President Barack Obama, while spending on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq continued.

The financial crisis that began in 2007 prompted the Obama administration and Congress to borrow more money for an economic rescue package in 2009, while the ensuing recession lowered revenues. The Trump administration increased deficits to fund tax cuts and pay for pandemic relief.

"Neither party is exclusively responsible for the run-up in debt and deficits that we've seen in the 21st century," Lautz said. "Both parties share some of the blame, and both parties need to work together on long-term solutions."

William Gale, co-director of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, a partnership between two nonpartisan think tanks, said part of the problem is that elected officials seldom make the politically tough choices raising taxes and cutting spending on popular programs that could reduce deficits.

"In the long term, obviously there has to be a reckoning, because we're on a path that doesn't make sense, that's not sustainable," he said. "But in the short term, we have plenty of latitude."

For example, Gale said, the Congressional Budget Office projects the trust funds that support Social Security benefits will run dry in a decade. But Congress could fund Social Security with general revenues, even if that hurts future generations.

"It's always something that can be pushed off," he said. "It's hard to find a real back-to-the-wall moment."

Gale said he sees two options to overcome the short-term political calculations that make the debt problem seemingly unsolvable: a bipartisan commission of serious lawmakers who can share responsibility for unpopular choices, or a president who uses the bully pulpit to rally the nation behind those necessary steps to improve Americans' collective economic future.

In response to a question from The Spokesman-Review on Oct. 2, White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre said reducing the deficit is a priority for Biden, whose legislative accomplishments include funding intended to help the Internal Revenue Service crack down on tax dodging by corporations and the rich. The deal Biden struck with McCarthy in May to raise the debt limit would lower deficits by $1.5 trillion by 2033, the Congressional Budget Office projects.

"Clearly, this is a president that wants to focus on lowering the deficit," Jean-Pierre said. "This is something that you hear him talk about almost every time he talks about the economy."

Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Prez, a Democrat who represents southwest Washington, said Sept. 29 she wants to see a bipartisan commission to address budget deficits with a combination of spending cuts and higher taxes on the biggest corporations and richest Americans, who pay far lower tax rates today than they did in decades past.

McMorris Rodgers said the idea of a bipartisan budget commission has been discussed among House Republicans. Sen. Patty Murray, a Washington Democrat who chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee and led bipartisan budget negotiations that resulted in a 2013 deal, said Sept. 29 that such a process hadn't been formally raised as part of talks to avert a shutdown.

"I can tell you, after years of experience, words on a paper matter when you talk about something like that how much power they have, who's on it, how it's going to be decided, what the implementation is," Murray said. "I have not seen any of that language, and that's critical."

In remarks at the University of Wisconsin on Sept. 26, former House Speaker Paul Ryan, who was Murray's GOP counterpart in negotiations a decade ago, said he had little hope that lawmakers could fix the nation's debt problem anytime soon.

"We're going to have to rethink how we do our fiscal policy in the 21st century, so that we can have a good 21st century, so that we can stave off a debt crisis," Ryan said. "Our politics are so unserious right now that those kinds of comprehensive solutions aren't in the offing."

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Democrats and Republicans in Washington state agree the nation's ... - Centralia Chronicle