Dems can/will vote for boehner. Such votes can and will give boehner the absolute majority - If 46 repubs vote nonBoehner [and they may] then Nancy gets 18 Ds to vote for boehner and voila - boehner is speaker due to Dem votes.
That may more damaging to boehner than resigning. What a horrible thing to have written about you - elected by the opposition b/c your own party didn’t want you enough to elect you....
And although i don’t know the rules - I’d be willing to bet that such an occurrence would spur the Rs to unseat him and elect someone else.
...need a House rules person in here...
From Wikipedia:
“It is expected that members of the House vote for their party’s candidate. If they do not, they usually vote for someone else in their party or vote “present”. Those who vote for the other party’s candidate often face serious consequences, up to and including the loss of seniority. The last instance where a representative voted for the other party’s candidate was in 2000, when Democrat Jim Traficant of Ohio voted for Republican Dennis Hastert. In response, the Democrats stripped him of his seniority and he lost all of his committee posts.”
Regardless of the above, as others have noted, it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if Pelosi and Boehner have made a deal and Pelosi has “allowed” just enough crossover votes by the Dims with no harm coming to them wrt seniority, committee assignments, etc.
From Georgetown law: http://gai.georgetown.edu/can-boehner-be-removed-from-office/
Article 1, Section 2 of the Constitution establishes the position, and states that “The House of Representatives shall choose their Speaker and other officers; and shall have the sole power of impeachment.” Neither the Constitution nor the rules of the 113th Congress state anything specific about removing the Speaker.
The Jefferson Manual, written by Thomas Jefferson when he was Vice President, and used by the House as a supplement to its standing rules, in Section 9 states that “A Speaker may be removed at the will of the House and a Speaker pro tempore appointed.” But even that clause may not necessarily apply to removing a Speaker, as it follows examples of Speakers being replaced due to illness, and the appointing of Speakers pro tempore in those instances.
Nevertheless, it’s generally believed that a Speaker can be removed, which would be executed by a Member offering a resolution declaring the Office of the Speaker vacant. Such a resolution would be considered a question of constitutional privilege, and therefore a privileged motion, although again, it’s never been done. So the answer is there is no explicit procedure for removing a Speaker either in the Constitution or in the Rules of the House of Representatives for the 113th Congress.
> “What a horrible thing to have written about you - elected by the opposition b/c your own party didn’t want you enough to elect you....”
Yes, Thad Cochran in the Senate and his puppet-master McConnell would know how to handle that scenario....
> “And although i don’t know the rules - I’d be willing to bet that such an occurrence would spur the Rs to unseat him and elect someone else.”
Yes, very good insight as ‘spur’ is the operative word here.
If the rules allowed a point of order to force the democrats to vote first, then Conservatives who are sitting on the fence should surely be ‘spurred’ to vote for someone else other than Boehner.
As I posted above, Democrats don't even have to vote "for" Boehner. All they have to do is abstain or vote "present".
The Speaker is elected with a majority of the total votes for an individual. Abstentions subtract from the total.
This is exactly the strategy that the execrable TX Speaker Joe Straus uses. And, unfortunately, it works. If Boehner goes this route it makes him a wholely owned tool of Pelosi.
Nevertheless, I have emailed my Rep to support Louie.