George Santos Survives Expulsion Vote
Nov. 5th, 2023 08:19 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
canyonwalkerI wrote yesterday about Representative George Santos getting in deeper trouble from his ongoing lying and cheating. There's more news about him, of course. This past week the House of Representatives held a vote to expel him from Congress. Two house speakers now have waffled on doing such a thing. ...Actually, no, they haven't waffled; they've outright said they won't do it. Worse, they've said out loud the reason is they don't want to imperil their narrow majority. So they're explicitly fine with (admitted) liars and (alleged) thieves in Congress. Today's GOP, ladies and gentlemen!
To be fair, though, it's not all GOP members who are okay with this. The motion to expel was introduced by a few Republican members from districts neighboring the one George Santos represents. Consider it enlightened self interest if nothing else. The rules of the privileged motion in Congress allow it to bypass the ability of the speaker to refuse to schedule a vote.
The vote to expel was held Wednesday. It failed 179-213, with 13 voting Present. Note, while the motion didn't even receive a simple majority of the votes it needed a 2/3 supermajority to pass.
The votes to expel Santos were not cast along strict party lines. 24 Republicans voted in favor of expulsion. 31 Democrats voted against.
The rationale cited by Republicans against expulsion is that Santos hasn't been convicted of a crime... yet. (The Justice Department announced an expanded, 23 count indictment a few weeks ago.) And the House ethics committee hasn't finished its own investigation yet.
Not coincidentally the (Republican) committee chair announced after the motion was made and before the voting started that they would have something to report in two weeks, maybe. Understand that the house ethics committee is generally not known for vigorous investigation. In the past it has recommended expulsion only well after a member has been convicted in a criminal court. It seems likely that the committee chair's announcement was a deliberate move to shift the outcome of the vote by giving members a procedural fig leaf to hide behind.
Democratic members of the house who voted against expulsion cited similar rationale. They asserted that the threshold for expulsion should be a criminal conviction. That's not written in the Constitution or even in the House rules anywhere, so it's just a tradition. I'm a bit leery of that for two reasons. One, I think the House can hold itself and its members to a higher standard than "Don't get convicted of crimes we think are significant enough." Two, something that's merely a tradition, a norm of politics, can be broken at any time by politicians who don't care about political norms. See also, the entire MAGA movement.
Democrats voting against expulsion also warned that expelling Santos right now would set a dangerous precedent. They explain the current ad hoc standard of "No expulsion until after conviction of [certain] crimes" protects Democrats who've recently been accused by various Republican members, frequently without evidence, of lying and committing crimes.
On that basis I'm fine with keeping the standard of waiting until a criminal conviction before expulsion. The only remaining problem is that the wheels of justice turn so slowly. Though in the case of unpopular George Santos, he could lose reelection in 12 months even if his court case takes longer to resolve.
To be fair, though, it's not all GOP members who are okay with this. The motion to expel was introduced by a few Republican members from districts neighboring the one George Santos represents. Consider it enlightened self interest if nothing else. The rules of the privileged motion in Congress allow it to bypass the ability of the speaker to refuse to schedule a vote.
The vote to expel was held Wednesday. It failed 179-213, with 13 voting Present. Note, while the motion didn't even receive a simple majority of the votes it needed a 2/3 supermajority to pass.
The votes to expel Santos were not cast along strict party lines. 24 Republicans voted in favor of expulsion. 31 Democrats voted against.
The rationale cited by Republicans against expulsion is that Santos hasn't been convicted of a crime... yet. (The Justice Department announced an expanded, 23 count indictment a few weeks ago.) And the House ethics committee hasn't finished its own investigation yet.
Not coincidentally the (Republican) committee chair announced after the motion was made and before the voting started that they would have something to report in two weeks, maybe. Understand that the house ethics committee is generally not known for vigorous investigation. In the past it has recommended expulsion only well after a member has been convicted in a criminal court. It seems likely that the committee chair's announcement was a deliberate move to shift the outcome of the vote by giving members a procedural fig leaf to hide behind.
Democratic members of the house who voted against expulsion cited similar rationale. They asserted that the threshold for expulsion should be a criminal conviction. That's not written in the Constitution or even in the House rules anywhere, so it's just a tradition. I'm a bit leery of that for two reasons. One, I think the House can hold itself and its members to a higher standard than "Don't get convicted of crimes we think are significant enough." Two, something that's merely a tradition, a norm of politics, can be broken at any time by politicians who don't care about political norms. See also, the entire MAGA movement.
Democrats voting against expulsion also warned that expelling Santos right now would set a dangerous precedent. They explain the current ad hoc standard of "No expulsion until after conviction of [certain] crimes" protects Democrats who've recently been accused by various Republican members, frequently without evidence, of lying and committing crimes.
On that basis I'm fine with keeping the standard of waiting until a criminal conviction before expulsion. The only remaining problem is that the wheels of justice turn so slowly. Though in the case of unpopular George Santos, he could lose reelection in 12 months even if his court case takes longer to resolve.
