WASHINGTON — In a dim corner of the House of Representatives, Republican congressman Chris Smith (R-4th) was face to face with Speaker Mike Johnson. Nearby, watching, were Johnson’s two top whips, tasked with corralling votes and enforcing party unity.
In the House well a few paces away, a cluster of Republican lawmakers encircled a second New Jerseyan, Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-2nd). Like Johnson, they were pressing for support on a bill to allow employers not to pay workers who attend job-related training.
Together, Smith and Van Drew were holding up Tuesday’s roll-call vote.
Smith clutched a letter from the AFL-CIO, the nation’s most prominent labor organization, which opposed the legislation and two other Republican bills. And on Van Drew’s mind was how workers’ paychecks would shrink if he sided with his party.
Together, they voted no.
In a stunning defeat for Republican leaders, six members of their party — Smith and Van Drew included — cast votes with 209 Democrats, ultimately sinking the legislation. Rep. Tom Kean Jr. (R-7th) was the only New Jersey member to vote for the bill. A Kean spokesman didn’t comment when asked why the congressman voted for the legislation.
The drama and failed vote on a relatively minor bill last week underscore Republicans’ tenuous House majority and hint at a choppy coming year for Donald Trump and his allies in Congress. They’re floating the idea of pursuing major legislation, in particular about health care or the domestic economy.
Navigating a roll-call vote is far simpler than shepherding through Congress legislation with a multistep procedure, called budget reconciliation, Republicans employed last summer. That’s an intense process that takes months and entails assembling a bill in several sections rather than as a standalone.
Amid a thin majority, Republican leaders insist they will plunge ahead with another reconciliation proposal in the coming months.
Under this maneuver, Republicans last year wrote and passed a law to slash billions of dollars in federal funding for food and health programs and offer more than $4 trillion in tax cuts.
With reconciliation, legislation can pass the Senate on a simple-majority vote, rather than the 60-vote threshold required for most bills to break the filibuster.
Johnson’s problems will likely deepen in the coming months, after special elections for a Texas House seat and in New Jersey’s 11th District. The speaker can afford two Republicans to flip and still pass a given bill. But if Democrats prevail in both Texas and New Jersey, and the winners of those races are seated, Johnson will be able to afford only one defection. Democrats are favored in both races.
The House this week was scheduled to vote on two other Republican bills on labor issues, but leadership pulled them before they could reach the floor, where they likely would have been voted down.
“We’re totally in control of the House,” Johnson told reporters Tuesday night.
Members of Congress often tell their leaders if they plan to vote against the rest of the party.
In an interview with NJ Spotlight News, Van Drew said he didn’t tell leadership.
“Once I really understood and looked at the bill, I didn’t feel comfortable,” Van Drew said. “Bottom line: People who got a certain amount in their paychecks would get less. I don’t agree with that.”
The legislation would amend a 1938 federal law to exclude pay for workers’ time spent on “voluntary professional development activities” beyond regular hours. It would also remove workers’ protections for paid job training.
“As a result, employers could push essential training outside of regular work hours and off the clock, increasing unpaid work for low-wage workers,” the AFL-CIO said in a bill summary.
“While somebody may say it’s voluntary, but you need it for your job, it should not count against you with the employer. It’s as simple as that,” Smith said.
The four other Republicans who voted against the bill come from states with significant union histories. Two are from Pennsylvania, one from New York and the other from West Virginia.
“My father was a Teamster,” Smith said. “I grew up in a house that was very pro-labor, and I do believe that the laborer has to have the ability — that’s why I’m absolutely committed to collective bargaining — to have a fair share every time,” Smith said.
Rep. Herb Conaway (D-3rd), who represents a South Jersey district, like Van Drew, said Van Drew’s vote fits a pattern of backing labor legislation.
Conaway, a first-term member, said House Republicans will be more deliberate than usual about their votes this year.
“The Democrats should have a pretty big win coming in in the fall, and they know it,” Conaway said of Republicans. “They’re going to be very careful on a few of these votes that impact major constituencies.”
Top Republicans didn’t whip the bill that stalled last week as hard as they could have, some members said. “I think maybe they didn’t have a total sense of how there were a good number of people who had real concerns,” Van Drew said. “Normally, they would have whipped them a bit more.”
