After which there have been two.
With Democrat Tom Suozzi’s victory in a particular Home election in New York on Tuesday, the shrinking Republican majority within the Home dwindled even additional, leaving the G.O.P. capable of afford solely two defections from the celebration line on votes when all members are current.
That provides them virtually no cushion to cope with the inevitable absences brought on by sickness, journey delays, weddings, funerals and unexpected occasions that might preserve Republicans away from the Home flooring for votes. It comes as Congress is dealing with a crush of points, together with early-March deadlines for funding the federal government and a pending emergency nationwide safety spending invoice to ship assist to Ukraine, Israel and different American allies.
It additionally provides every particular person Home Republican much more leverage over Speaker Mike Johnson, who’s already struggling to steer his unmanageable majority.
“I might be continually on protection, I might be making an attempt to keep away from defeats, and I might be very, very cautious,” former Speaker Newt Gingrich mentioned in an interview.
The risks of the slim margin had been already obvious on Tuesday evening, even earlier than Mr. Suozzi received the Lengthy Island seat previously occupied by George Santos, the Republican lawmaker who was expelled from the Home in December.
Of their second try to impeach Alejandro N. Mayorkas, the homeland safety secretary, Republicans succeeded by only one vote after three of their members broke with the celebration to oppose it. If both of the 2 Democrats who had been absent had proven up, the impeachment that Republicans had been promising their voters for greater than a yr would have failed once more. (The 2 Democratic absentees had been Consultant Judy Chu of California, who mentioned she was isolating after testing optimistic for the coronavirus, and Consultant Lois Frankel of Florida, who was grounded by a delayed flight.)
“That impeachment decision couldn’t cross now,” mentioned Aaron Fritschner, a longtime adviser to Consultant Don Beyer, Democrat of Virginia, who mentioned Mr. Suozzi’s seat flip “imperils each Republicans’ capability to carry the Home in November and their capability to manipulate till then.”
“Beneath Republican management, the Home has seen historic quantities of chaos and paralysis, and it’s about to get somewhat bit crazier,” Mr. Fritschner added.
After Mr. Suozzi is sworn in, Republicans will maintain 219 seats to Democrats’ 213, down three from after they received a slender majority in November 2022, due to a mix of coincidence, scandal, well being points and political turmoil.
On Wednesday, as they watched their majority get even smaller, some Republicans had been ruing the choice by their colleagues to expel Mr. Santos, who served as a dependable Republican vote in Congress regardless of being a serial fabulist, a determine of nationwide ridicule and the topic of a 23-count federal indictment.
Consultant Byron Donalds, Republican of Florida, instructed CNN that Mr. Santos had but to be discovered responsible of any crimes when he was expelled and, “to pre-empt that, to attain political factors, was silly.”
The minuscule majority shall be Speaker Mike Johnson’s actuality for the approaching yr. In April, Democrats are prone to fill a secure seat that was occupied by Consultant Brian Higgins, Democrat of New York, who left Congress earlier this month to turn into president of the Shea Performing Arts Middle. That seat received’t change the margin of management, however will permit even much less room for Republican absences.
There shall be some modest aid for Republicans within the late spring and early summer time, when they’re prone to fill two secure seats that had been vacated by Consultant Invoice Johnson, Republican of Ohio, who left Congress to turn into the president of Youngstown State College; and former Consultant Kevin McCarthy, who resigned from his California seat on the finish of final yr after being ousted from the speakership.
However with a Republican convention that’s extra usually divided in opposition to itself than performing as a united entrance, it’ll stay tough for Mr. Johnson to cross any payments that rely strictly on votes from his personal celebration.
Mr. Gingrich mentioned the one approach ahead for Mr. Johnson was to vastly decrease expectations of what Home Republicans might be anticipated to perform.
“Johnson has to promote the nation that having Home Republicans who use the investigative instrument, and who block unhealthy concepts, is all you will get till the election,” he mentioned. “After which we’ll see if we now have a greater future. He shouldn’t exhaust himself making an attempt to do issues he can’t do.”
Vin Weber, a former Republican congressman from Minnesota, mentioned the G.O.P. had made a nasty state of affairs worse due to its deep inner divisions.
“At the start of this Congress, you can have imagined the tightness of the margins would make Republicans band collectively,” Mr. Weber mentioned. As a substitute, he mentioned, the slim majority had emboldened the exhausting proper to stage inner rebellions to press its personal agenda, relatively than falling in line to assist the celebration put up a united entrance in opposition to President Biden and Democrats.
Mr. Johnson, like Mr. McCarthy earlier than him, has responded by discovering methods to steer round right-wing rebels and work with Democrats to cross crucial measures. Mr. Johnson has performed so lately by counting on a procedural movement that permits him to briefly droop Home guidelines and pace laws via however requires a two-thirds majority for passage.
Mr. Johnson has acknowledged the constricting actuality of wielding such a fragile majority.
“We cope with the numbers we now have,” he mentioned on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”
However as his first, failed try to impeach Mr. Mayorkas confirmed in a humiliating trend, with inevitable absences, he won’t at all times know what numbers he has to cope with.
Home Republican leaders have stepped up their efforts to maintain tabs on their members’ whereabouts, however that may typically be like herding cats. Lawmakers usually journey with out letting leaders know of their plans, regardless of a requirement to present discover when attainable. Generally a frontrunner learns of a lawmaker’s location solely when she or he posts a video or {a photograph} on social media.
“Sicknesses, funerals, weddings — all of these issues should be taken under consideration in a approach that they weren’t earlier than,” Mr. Weber mentioned. “Members should not used to having to be accountable for his or her whereabouts always. The Home of Representatives could be very a lot a gaggle of particular person entrepreneurs. They don’t wish to have to inform anyone the place they’re going to be and after they’re going to be there.”
On massive votes, members mentioned, it’s now understood that everybody shall be current until they’ve given discover that they can’t be there. On Tuesday, for example, Consultant Brian Mast, Republican of Florida, notified leaders that his flight was delayed and that he wouldn’t make the vote.
For Republicans, it was uncomfortably shut.
“Fortunately, regardless of mechanical failures on my flight, we nonetheless had sufficient votes to question him tonight,” Mr. Mast posted on social media after the vote in opposition to Mr. Mayorkas.
