Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) knocked Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) on Tuesday after she declared that members of Congress “need to show up for work” as she argued in opposition to proxy voting within the chamber ― even for brand new dad and mom.
“She doesn’t seem to be that upset over the fact that Donald Trump conducts most of his business from a golf course in Mar-a-Lago,” McGovern stated of the president, who has to this point handed taxpayers a $26 million invoice for golf outings in his second time period.
McGovern’s remarks arrived previous to the Home advancing a rule ― backed by Reps. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) and Brittany Pettersen (D-Colo.), each of whom are new dad and mom ― to permit a member of Congress to vote by proxy for as much as 12 weeks or extra after the delivery or adoption of a kid.
It marked a defeat for Home Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) as Luna overcame celebration management’s efforts to dam her invoice.
Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Name, Inc. by way of Getty Pictures
Foxx, the chair of the Home Guidelines Committee who has beforehand slammed her colleagues for leaning on proxy voting, turned to the Merriam-Webster dictionary’s definition of Congress to emphasize that the chamber is concerning the “act of coming together and meeting.”
“I’ve never voted by proxy because I believe it undermines the fabric of that sacred act of convening,” she stated.
“I know there’s a new laptop class in America that seems to operate increasingly in a virtual space, but that’s simply not a fact of life for most of American workers,” she continued.
McGovern, in his response to Foxx, famous that Johnson has turned to proxy voting dozens of instances, FBI Director Kash Patel has requested to work remotely from his Las Vegas residence, and Guidelines Committee members have used proxy voting to go to the 2021 Conservaitve Political Motion Convention.
“I mean the bottom line is Republicans love to talk about family values but when given the chance to actually support families, they turn their backs,” he stated.
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“She talks about looking into Webster’s dictionary about the definition of Congress,” he added. “Well, while you’re at it, look up the definition of representation. There’s nothing that says that you can’t represent your constituents or that you shouldn’t be able to represent them because you just had a new baby.”
