(RepublicanDaily.org) – House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries are in the process of establishing a bipartisan task force to remove members from committees moving forward, CNN reported. This followed back-and-forth between the parties for the removal of Republicans and Democrats from respective committees.
The House Speaker proposed the bipartisan process following the fallout from his decision to remove prominent Democrats from committees. Representative Ilhan Omar (D. Minnesota) was removed from the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Additionally, McCarthy withheld positions on the House Intelligence Committee from Democratic California Representatives Eric Swalwell and Adam Schiff.
While McCarthy reasoned that he had removed Omar from the Committee due to a series of anti-Semitic remarks, Omar told Democratic media analysts that it was political retaliation, NBC reported. In Omar’s view, she was removed from the Committee as retaliation for Democrats removing Republican Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene, of Georgia, and Paul Gosar, of Arizona from the Budget Committee and the Education and Labor Committee. Greene was reportedly removed from her assignments due to the discovery of violent statements she had made.
Likewise, Democrats accused McCarthy of denying committee seats to Swalwell and Schiff to “remove obstacles to his agenda,” The Washington Post wrote. McCarthy maintained that he denied the seats to the two Congressmen due to concerns about national security about their performance in Congress, The Hill reported. Swalwell has had reported affiliations with a Chinese intelligence informant called Fang Fang, and Schiff was accused by McCarthy of lying to the American people during his presiding over the impeachment of former President Donald Trump.
Following Omar’s removal, some Republicans voiced that they were reluctant to make the decision, while Democrats were outraged, Channel 3000 reported.
McCarthy and Jeffries’s processes on cooperation over committee removal follow recent intense political rivalry. Jeffries “ripped” McCarthy for giving January 6 footage to Fox News, calling this act an “egregious security breach,” Axios reported. Jeffries stated that he and his team would be handling the potential national security implications he perceived came from McCarthy, allowing Fox News to obtain the footage. Media reports stated that Fox News anchorman Tucker Carlson had “downplayed” the official accounts of the events of January 6, arguing that the tapes he obtained from McCarthy would reveal the “actual events” of January 6.
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