Proposed rule changes, by the House Freedom Caucus, in the House of Representatives

- Click here for a list of the changes.

For commentary, see below: 

- From the Hill: House GOP hashes out internal rules with McCarthy Speakership on the line.

House Republicans started consideration of internal conference rules change proposals on Wednesday, a major priority for right-wing members who have withheld support for House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) to be Speaker.

Several of the proposals were introduced by members of the House Freedom Caucus, which released a list of rules change demands for the GOP conference and the House as a whole over the summer that aim to empower individual members and strip away at that of leadership.

- From Fox News: Moderate House GOP ready to push back against Freedom Caucus rule changes.

Moderate Republicans are preparing to flex their political muscles to ensure their newly-won but narrow House majority is not hijacked by conservative hard-liners from the Freedom Caucus who are looking to impose a new set of rules in 2023.

Rep. Dave Joyce, who leads the moderate 50-member Republican Governance Group, said there is a misconception that the Freedom Caucus will be able to dictate terms to House GOP leaders next year because of the slim majority Republicans will hold.

"They make the most noise, but as far as being productive that's not necessarily true," said Joyce, R-Ohio. "It's a lot of smoke and mirrors."

 
- From the Hill: Freedom Caucus demands rule changes for House and GOP conference.

First, the Freedom Caucus wants a formal “majority of the majority” rule for the conference. Such a rule would ensure that legislation passed in the House is also supported by a majority of House Republicans. The Speaker of the House, regardless of party, generally follows that pattern, dubbed the Hastert Rule, but it has been broken in the past.

. . . A measure to significantly increase the number of members on the GOP Conference Steering Committee by adding more “regional representative” positions. That would have the effect of reducing GOP leadership’s power in major party decisions.

- From Roll Call: Freedom Caucus members want to decentralize power in the House. But what does that really mean?

The far-right Freedom Caucus is demanding a suite of changes to the Republican Conference rules and House rules that would reverse a decadelong trend of power consolidating in the speaker’s grip. Done right, such a shift could herald a renaissance of bipartisan legislating, experts say. But done wrong, it will exacerbate partisan tensions and empower extremists, all but ensuring legislative deadlock that could force federal government shutdowns and a sovereign debt crisis.

“There’s a real question about whether the Freedom Caucus members want to pursue a positive legislative agenda or whether their goal is to simply be an agent of chaos,” said Daniel Schuman, policy director at Demand Progress.

“Congress has been testing this speaker-dominant model for at least 30 years,” said Kevin Kosar, congressional scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. “Certainly it has some advantages in terms of being able to make commitments to voters and then push legislation through the House on party-line votes. The downside is legislators feel like they’re not legislators.