Kansas Rep. Tim Huelskamp, one of the 25 Republicans who
voted against Speaker John Boehner on Tuesday, says "My colleagues fully expect" retaliation for those votes. Which is good, because the retaliation against some of them has already started:
Boehner moved swiftly to boot two of the insurgents from the influential Rules Committee. That could be just the start of payback for the speaker’s betrayers, who might see subcommittee chairmanships and other perks fall away in the coming months.
Boehner’s allies have thirsted for this kind of action from the speaker, saying he’s let people walk all over him for too long and is too nice to people who are eager to stab him in the back. The removal of Florida Reps. Daniel Webster and Richard Nugent from Rules was meant as a clear demonstration that what Boehner and other party leaders accepted during the previous Congress is no longer acceptable, not with the House’s biggest GOP majority in decades.
Of course, today's far-right Republicans thrive on a sense of themselves as victims, so while the loss of committee seats and subcommittee chairmanships may sting, it should be salved by the sense of noble oppression.
And while the poorly organized effort to push the speaker election to a second ballot may have fizzled, Boehner "receiv[ed] the highest number of nays from members of his own party of any speaker candidate in many decades" despite having campaigned more aggressively for votes than in past years.
So consider the signal sent on both sides: Boehner faces increased rebellion from his caucus. But that rebellion may come at a cost. In short, a recipe for Republican discord.