intersting take on why the main character starts out as majority whip. You may be onto something. I think they minimize the Speaker, and the entire Senate for that matter - but I understand a series can only tolerate a limited number of characters.
He’s a backroom brawler, and a cleanup man. The books discuss it a lot more overtly, both sets of TV shows really just hint at it. But basically if you’ve got yourself a dead hooker, or angry cuckold, or drug dealer who finally has figured out where he’s seen your face before, you call old FU and certain things/ people disappear. But there is a price. And if your constituents get angry about that vote, well maybe you shouldn’t have so many bad habits, chief of which being sloppy about your bad habits.
But in all 3 he’s wanting to move out of the backroom, get a prestigious gig with the new incoming government they helped win. And he gets passed over (mostly because nobody actually likes him, because who really likes their professional blackmailer), and it’s vengeance time. It’ll be interesting to see what they do for season 3, I will say they did a better job of setting up the building blocks for what the other 2 versions did with the third installment than the other 2 versions did (which is as close to spoiling things as I’ll get in public, anybody wanting more can PM me).