At least 13 House Republics have submitted paperwork to get colleagues to vote on the COVID-19 bill Friday night, citing the ongoing pandemic. However, they will also speak at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Orlando, Florida.
Republican Rep. Madison Cawthorn and Ted Budd of North Carolina, Matt Gaetz and Greg Steube of Florida, Paul Gosar of Arizona, Mark Green of Tennessee, Devin Nunes of California, Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania, Darrell Issa of California, Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Ralph Norman of South Carolina, Jim Banks of Indiana and Ronny Jackson of Texas, submitted paperwork to the house clerk this week, saying: ‘I am unable to physically attend the proceedings in the living room due to the ongoing public health emergency. ‘
Cawthorn, Budd, Gaetz and Steube would address the Conservative rally on Friday, while the others said for Saturday and Sunday.
In a statement, a spokesman for Budd said: “After the Democrats rearranged the roster with extraordinary late notice, Rep. Budd had to be forced to vote for a proxy for the first time. Rep. Budd is still philosophically opposed to proxy vote, so he has already donated his congressional salary for the days he is proxy to the North Carolina Restaurant Workers Relief Fund to support restaurants closed during the pandemic.The mention of the pandemic in the letter is the standard language used by both parties must use the power of attorney. vote. ”
In May 2020, he introduced a bill entitled “No Pay for Proxy Voting Act.”
At least four Democrats also have their colleagues cast their votes on the COVID-19 relief package. Representatives from Texas, Sheila Jackson Lee, Al Green, Lizzie Fletcher and Sylvia Garcia, nominated proxies while meeting with President Biden in Texas on Friday during his trip to investigate the damage from the recent snowstorms.
House President Nancy Pelosi implemented proxy voting in May 2020 to give House members a way to vote while avoiding travel that could expose them to COVID-19 during the pandemic. She has since cast several votes.
The move drew criticism from Republicans, especially after Florida Democrats Charlie Crist and Darren Soto submitted proxies on the health emergency and were later found to have attended the SpaceX rocket launch in their home states.
Before he was elected, Cawthorn tweeted“Leaders show up, no matter how uncertain the times. The Democrats are cowards to hide and not show up at work. I think we can label them ‘Non-essential Staff’?”
Jonathan Wilcox, a spokesman for Issa, said the California Republican “complies with all the rules of the House vote to cast his opposition to what the Democrats” label COVID relief, “but it spends more than 90 percent of the total amount of non-COVID expenditure.
“After hundreds of attempts by Republicans to summarily reject the dual consensus of previous COVID legislation, it is clear that the Democrats have no desire to find solutions. Just bias,” Wilcox said.
GOP whip Steve Scalise of Louisiana accused members of using proxy votes to “play hooked.”
“They claim they ‘could not show up’ because of the ongoing public health emergency ‘- but are going to attend the rocket. This is not Ferris Bueller’s day. This is the US Congress,” he said. posted on Twitter.
A Scalise spokesman confirmed that he had canceled his speech at the conference due to the votes Friday night.
Kimberly Brown contributed to this story