WATCH: Kaylee McGhee White lays out challenges for GOP after Georgia letdown
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The Washington Examiner’s Kaylee McGhee White says Republicans will likely have a “tough” time passing legislation in the next two years after the Georgia Senate runoff on Tuesday handed Democrats a true majority in the Senate.
“It’s gonna be tough to pass a lot of the priorities that Republicans were hoping to get done this next congressional cycle, that’s for sure,” White said Wednesday on Fox Business.
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She said their priorities will have to shift to blocking President Joe Biden and his administration from “shoving through” additional spending bills or policies.
“Their only job is to make sure that Biden is a lame duck for the next two years,” White told host David Asman.
“Whether they’re going to be able to do that, whether they can form some agreement on these issues, is going to be really important this next year,” she added.
When asked if Republicans will be able to do anything in the next session, White seemed optimistic. She shared that bipartisan bills are common around this time of the year.
“It always seems like at the end of each fiscal year, [there is] a lot of bipartisan consensus, and we’re already starting to see that a little bit in the Senate … We’re hearing whispers about bipartisan immigration reform right now, even while the Senate is still controlled by Democrats,” she said.
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“There are hopeful signs that even though Democrats do control the Senate in the next year, that maybe they’ll be able to work towards some agreement on some of these issues that voters would like to see reformed,” she added, pointing to immigration and inflation as examples.
Another challenge plaguing the House GOP conference is division, as Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) faces opposition in his quest to replace Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) as speaker.
Former House Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Biggs (R-AZ) relaunched his campaign for the speaker’s gavel against McCarthy on Tuesday, saying he was running in order to “break the establishment.”
In order to weld any power in the next congressional session, Republicans will have to bind together. Eventually, Biggs could throw his support behind McCarthy, but it would take some compromise, White said.
“I’m sure that Andy Biggs and some of the more conservative members of the House are really hoping for some concessions from McCarthy before they end up making that call,” she noted, saying it would be surprising if they didn’t.
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“To be honest, the bigger risk here is if Republicans aren’t able to come to an agreement on who’s going to be the next speaker [and] that Democrats would use their still fairly sizable minority to actually choose someone else for them.”
White pointed out that it didn’t matter which one, but there just needs to be a “common agreement.”