Approximately 30 conservative House Republicans are launching a new caucus designed to advance the needs of the people over the special interests and do everything possible to help Republicans keep their campaign promises on immigration, Obamacare and more.
The House Freedom Caucus officially launched Monday night. Rep. Raul Labrador (R-Idaho) is one of the founding members. He says there are multiple reasons why the Freedom Caucus is needed, starting with the need to keep priorities straight in Washington.
“We want a freedom agenda, an agenda that represents the people back home. I think that’s the main concern that a lot of us have in the House. Both parties seem to do pretty well representing special interests, but we have very few people representing what the folks back home are really interested in, and that’s what we’re interested in doing,” said Labrador.
He says that mission starts with making good on what GOP candidates vowed to do if given the majority in Congress.
“The most important thing is keeping the promises that we made to our constituents. You have a lot of members of Congress who say really nice things to get elected. Then they get back here and they forget those promises because they think their constituents won’t remember every two years. I think the American people are getting fed up with that and we’re hoping to represent those people who feel that they don’t have a voice here in Washington,” said Labrador.
So what promise comes first on the checklist? Fighting back against President Obama’s unilateral immigration action that grants legal status to at least five million people in the U.S. illegally.
“Every one of those new senators told their constituents that they were going to fight Obama’s unconstitutional action. They get elected, they come here to Washington, D.C., and now we’re being told that it’s too difficult to pass anything in the Senate because they only have 54 votes. Last year, the excuse was that they didn’t have the Senate. Now that they have the Senate, their excuse is that they only have 54 votes,” said Labrador.
Labrador says recent history proves that a determined Republican Senate majority can get things done, even if it’s dealing with the the president of the opposite party.
“When Bill Clinton was president, you had a small majority in the Senate that passed welfare reform. We can pass things here in the Senate. We just need to push the agenda, drive it through the media (and) go to the states of vulnerable Democrats and let them know that their senators are not working to stop the president’s agenda,” he said.
Pushing the Senate to strip funding out of the Homeland Security appropriations bill is the first mission of the House Freedom Caucus.
“We can’t do anything about the president vetoing legislation, but we can do something about passing something in the House and passing something in the Senate that stops the president’s agenda, and moving forward and fighting the president and letting the American people know that this president is willing to shut down the government just so he can take care of five million people that are here illegally in the United States,” said Labrador.
However, Labrador says the caucus has not arrived at a plan of action if the Senate does strip out funding for the Obama immigration action and Obama vetoes the larger bill.
“We haven’t gotten there yet. We’re going to take every fight one step at a time,” said Labrador.
Beyond immigration, Labrador wants to see the House Freedom Caucus push GOP leaders to pass a full repeal of Obamacare. He says another critical issue to address is tax reform.
“The fact that you have a bunch of different corporations and special interests that are getting special breaks here in Washington. You have Republicans that try to defend those special breaks and then you have Democrats that want to get rid of them just so they can raise taxes on the American people. I think we can use those exemptions to lower taxes on every American,” said Labrador.
For over 40 years, the conservative message on policy and priorities has been articulated through the Republican Study Committee (RSC), the largest caucus on Capitol Hill. Many media reports suggest the creation of the House Freedom Caucus resulted from conservative frustration that the RSC was getting too cozy with GOP leadership. Labrador says was not the catalyst for the new caucus.
“I’m not sure that anybody thought it wasn’t conservative enough. We just thought it was too big to be effective. When you have two-thirds of the conference in a room trying to make a decision on how to move forward on conservative policy, it makes it very difficult to come to a consensus. It became more of a debating society,” said Labrador.
In what may surprise some on the right, Labrador says leaders of the party and the RSC are welcoming the new group.
“It’s been very positive because one of our main goals is not to surprise leadership. I think sometimes as conservatives and as members of Congress, we’re not well organized. I think now by being organized, we’ve let our leadership know which way we want to go. We’re going to send them signals. We’re not just going to try to surprise them on the House floor,” said Labrador, who says the ultimate goal is to have a positive relationship with leadership in advancing a conservative agenda.
In addition to Labrador, the founding members of the House Freedom Caucus include Reps. Justin Amash (Mich.), Ron DeSantis (Fla.), John Fleming (La.), Scott Garrett (N.J.), Jim Jordan (Ohio),Mark Meadows (N.C.), Mick Mulvaney (S.C.) and Matt Salmon (Ariz.). Labrador says there are about 30 total members so far. He says the size of the caucus is a balancing act and much will be expected of the members.
“It has to be big enough where it makes a difference with the vote. The group also has to be willing to stick together. People need to understand when they belong to a group like this (that) we’re going to be making decisions and it’s not about the one individual having his agenda alone being the one heard,” said Labrador.
