Speaker Mike Johnson gave House members some unexpected time off this week due to a spat over proxy voting. He also gave House Democrats a talking point: Republicans don’t want to get any work done in Washington.
“Can’t we do something that’s relevant to some of these major issues that are in front of us today?” Rep. Glenn Ivey told NOTUS in a phone interview. “People talked about the last Congress being a ‘do nothing’ Congress. This one may be off to a worse start than the last one was.”
Johnson canceled votes for the remainder of the week on Tuesday after a bipartisan rebuke of his policy on proxy voting. NOTUS checked in with nine House Democrats, who said they tried to make the best of their time off with district events, media appearances and unfinished work in the Capitol — and, of course, calling out the GOP.