EXCLUSIVE — The House Freedom Caucus is preparing to wield its power in the next Congress, hoping that President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House will bolster their influence in the lower chamber.
“The president knows that the strongest supporters in Congress are in the House Freedom Caucus,” Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD), chairman of the Freedom Caucus, told the Washington Examiner in an interview. “I think we will have the attention of the White House and his ear to bring them along more to our point of view.”
Since its inception in 2015, the Freedom Caucus has been known for its conservative reputation and tendency to buck GOP leadership on key pieces of legislation, with members often threatening to withhold their support on must-pass spending bills unless certain demands are met. Those practices have frequently made the caucus a thorn in leadership’s side, especially in the current Congress as GOP leaders have had to navigate a historically slim majority and a stubborn right flank.
That prompted House Republicans to rely repeatedly on the other party to help negotiate bipartisan deals that could pass the Democratic-controlled Senate and White House to avert government shutdowns.
As a result, the Freedom Caucus has lost some of its potency in the last two years. The conservative group has seen its membership thin out with the departures of high-profile figures such as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA). The group also received a blow when its former chairman, Rep. Bob Good (R-VA), lost his primary earlier this year.
But now the Freedom Caucus, which touts its reputation as being closely aligned with Trump, could see its influence over the House increase when Republicans take over the White House and Senate next year.
Harris argued that the Freedom Caucus has already been able to flex its muscles to achieve its goals, pointing to key pieces of legislation that passed the House last year, such as H.R. 2, Republicans’ signature border bill, that the group gave key input to its language. But now with the Senate in GOP hands, Harris expects that influence to grow.
“Because we didn’t control the Senate … they usually didn’t go anywhere,” Harris said. “We had huge inputs in the House. I suspect that our inputs will now extend beyond the House because we now have a majority in the Senate.”
But even with Trump’s presence in the White House, that does not necessarily mean Freedom Caucus members will not raise objections to things they do not like.
There was occasional headbutting between Trump and the Freedom Caucus during his first term. One of the first bills pushed by the Trump administration was in March 2017 to repeal the Affordable Care Act and replace it with the American Health Care Act.
However, the bill was later pulled from consideration due to opposition from the Freedom Caucus, whose members argued that the new proposal did not do enough to repeal specific elements of the original Affordable Care Act. Trump then publicly criticized the group for tanking the bill, and he later “declared war” on the faction by urging Republicans to “fight them” in the 2018 midterm elections if they “don’t get on the team.”
Trump has since repaired his relationship with many of the current caucus members, but that does not mean the group will not speak up over policy disagreements.
“There’s massive overlap with the Trump agenda, with Freedom Caucus and conservatives in the House generally, so I’m not actually worried about that,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX), a member of the Freedom Caucus who has frequently disagreed with Trump’s positions, told the Washington Examiner.
“Where there are differences, we’ll voice the differences,” Roy added. “There’ll be differences within the conference. There’ll be differences from one end of Pennsylvania Avenue to the other. There always is.”
But although Roy said he will not “shy away from expressing” his opinions, he and other members of the caucus say their goal is to unite the GOP conference — something that party leaders have urged them to do over the last few years.
Evidence of that unity has already begun to culminate after Harris managed to concoct a deal with the centrist Main Street Caucus over the GOP conference rules package earlier this week.
Harris met with Main Street Caucus Chairman Dusty Johnson (R-SD) and Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) to craft an agreement after members of the conservative Freedom Caucus criticized proposed rule changes to punish certain lawmakers who speak out against leadership.
Dusty Johnson and members of the Main Street Caucus agreed to withdraw their proposed amendments in exchange for a new threshold to the motion to vacate, a procedure that allows members to vote on removing the House speaker.
The deal would increase the motion-to-vacate threshold to nine members, up from the current one-member minimum, to avoid the drama the House has dealt with during the current Congress. In October 2023, then-Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) managed to boot then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) by filing the resolution on his own, and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) sought to remove Mike Johnson in May.
Other lawmakers who have historically been critical of the Freedom Caucus have also met with their conservative colleagues to bury the hatchet, including Rep. Derrick Van Orden (R-WI), who said he is privately urging his colleagues to stand together as one party.
“The time to make sure that we unite as a conference and as a Congress with the White House is now,” Van Orden told the Washington Examiner. “I’m a man of my word. I sat down with a bunch of people in this conference, looked them in the eye, and they gave me their word, and I’m going to take them at their word.”
Others are cautiously optimistic that Freedom Caucus members will uphold their end of the bargain and work to advance the GOP agenda in Congress next year.
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“I think that anyone in the House Freedom Caucus is more than capable to come to an agreement and reach a deal only if they want to,” Rep. Max Miller (R-OH), who has openly criticized the conservative group, told the Washington Examiner. “We just wish that they would want to be a part of the team. So when you tell me that they’re saying that they want to be a part of the team, it makes me happy, and it genuinely does. I just want to see them do the work.
“It’s nice to say you want to be a team player, but show me you’re a team player,” he added. “Show me how you will come to bat for everyone in the conference.”