McCarthy and Jeffries Form Task Force to Set Process for Booting Lawmakers from Committees

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R.Calif.) and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffreyries (D.NY) have created a bipartisan taskforce to establish a process for expulsion of lawmakers from their committees. 

Sources claim that McCarthy asked Nancy Mace (R.S.C.) to head the task force while Jeffries coordinated a list eligible Democrats to join. 

After Ilhan Omar, a Democratic-MN Representative, made antisemitic remarks about Israel that were criticised by both Democrats as well as Republicans, the House Republicans voted to remove her from her position on House Committee on Foreign Affairs. 

Omar was removed from her Committee by every Republican except for one, though several GOP members were still concerned about the lack of due process in her removal. 

According to reports, they compared it with the process under Nancy Pelosi (D–Calif), when Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Paul Gosar were removed from their respective committee assignments during the previous Congress, which was controlled by Democrats. 

After being accused of spreading hate speech, Greene was expelled from the Budget and Education and Labor Committee in 2021. “racist conspiracy theories” You can find them on social media. After posting a video showing him hurting Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), and President Joe Biden a few months later in November, Gosar lost his seat on the Oversight and Reform and Natural Resources committees.

McCarthy removed Eric Swalwell and Adam Schiff (D.Calif.), from their committees in January. Democrats claimed this was an illegal action. “political vengeance” After Greene’s and Gosar’s departure. 

Senior GOP aides stated that the task force’s objective is to locate “a way to not have this devolve into every time it flips, anybody the majority doesn’t like comes off their committees.”