Gingrich warns Freedom Caucus to study his time, conservatives send demand letter after Johnson vote

Former Speaker Newt Gingrich, who in 1994 led Republicans to their first House majority in four decades, said Saturday that the House Freedom Caucus should look back at how his own caucus led conservatives to power in the party.

Gingrich said on Twitter that he and other conservatives developed the “Affirmative Action Principles” in 1983 as part of what they called a Conservative Opportunity Society.

“[Those] The contract with the United States was signed 11 years later and it secured a Republican House majority for the first time in 40 years.

“If the Freedom Caucus could study them, they could be much more effective,” Gingrich said. He went on to quote and agree with political reporter Mark Halperin in his NewsWorld newsletter. .

“[T]The Freedom Caucus is a group of insurgents with a set of goals but no consistent path to achieving them,” Halperin wrote.

In the 1980s, while Ronald Reagan was in the White House, Boston Democratic Speaker Tip O’Neill maintained strong control of the House of Representatives. O’Neill and Reagan had a cordial relationship but were ideologically distinct.

Consistent with the early days of C-SPAN live telecasts, Gingrich often came to the House floor late at night to address conservative issues in a nearly empty room but with viewers riveted by the new television format.

Gingrich slams Harris’ ‘nonsense’ speech

Gingrich’s biographer Craig Shirley told Fox News Digital on Saturday that the Freedom Caucus should study the work of its predecessor, the Conservative Opportunity Association, and Gingrich’s path from low-profile congressman to speaker.

“I think the word ‘brilliant’ is thrown around so, so carelessly. So I would just say that defending conservative governance is extremely smart politics,” Shirley said of Gingrich’s work in the 1980s and 1990s. Said while working.

“Reagan had already blazed the trail eight years before Gingrich.”

While critics say the Republican Party has moved sharply to the right on some issues and softened on others, Shirley said this is essentially the same story as it was during Gingrich’s rise.

“Less government, more freedom, less taxes, strong defense, pro-life.”

Another senior member of Gingrich’s conservative group, former Minnesota Rep. Vin Weber, told PBS that groups like the Conservative Opportunity Association (or Freedom Caucus) There were not many groups at the time of the interview), and there was the same problem of fear of angering their party leaders.

Weber said that before the Reagan era, there had been a number of small conservative groups within the caucus, including one in the 1960s led by then-Rep. Donald Rumsfeld, R-Ill. – He later served twice as head of the Pentagon.

On the last day of the 1982 meeting, Gingrich approached Weber and asked, “What are you going to do next year and the next 10 years?”

“I thought it was funny, and I said, ‘I’d love to be back here, but other than that it’s nothing special,'” Weber recalled.

“What he said was that as a human being, he was not effective… He was [GOP] Participate in a meeting as someone [who] Always supported his views and maybe had some organizational skills,” Weber said.

Mike Johnson re-elected Speaker of the House of Representatives

Shirley said the current Freedom Caucus, if they get it right, will have a rare opportunity to achieve their goals with Republicans in full control of Washington.

“They don’t have a ‘contract,’ but they have the next best thing. They have a core set of issues and an ideology that they can easily follow,” he said, adding that “no one should doubt” that Mike Johnson Commitment to the principles of “Reaganism”.

In additional comments to Fox News’ “Hannity,” Gingrich said Friday’s round of voting was a “great victory” for Johnson, a Los Angeles Republican.

“[He’s] Just a decent, hard-working, smart guy… there’s no way I could be the speaker he was. I don’t have that patience. I don’t have the ability to move on. This is really, really extraordinary.

Meanwhile, Freedom Caucus member Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) told Fox News that the group had met with Johnson earlier and that he “just didn’t feel ‘eh’ or be willing to work for Trump’s agenda.” “War”.

“I put it in the context of what’s happened in the last 14 months, we have 1,500 pages of consolidated bills that you can’t read – no spending cuts to offset $100 billion in new spending.”

“I know we had a slim majority, but now that’s over. What we want to impress is [Johnson] Yesterday was, will you fight for these things that we’ve been asking for, like balancing the budget? Like offset? Like supporting all of Trump’s agenda?

Norman and Rep. Keith Self, R-Texas, initially withheld their votes for Johnson, which would have led to a second round of speakership votes.

But Norman told Story the action was “the only way to make my voice heard.”

He said Johnson “made a commitment” to fight for the things he mentioned to Fox News, and that agreement, combined with a message from Trump that Johnson was the only supported speaker candidate in the caucus , guided his eventual decision to support the Louisiana native.

In a “Dear Colleague” letter released Friday, House Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris, R-Md., and its members expressed several policy points that Johnson should commit to “turning around the Biden- The damage to the Harris administration”. and achieving long-term conservative goals.

The letter stated that they voted for Johnson because of their “firm support” for Trump and to ensure that the elector certification on January 6 could proceed smoothly.

“We did this despite our sincere reservations about the Speaker’s performance over the past 15 months.”

The caucus called on Johnson to amend the House calendar to make it as busy as the Senate, ensure reconciliation legislation “actually” reduces spending and deficits, and stop bill debates on amendments that violate the “72-hour rule.”

Click here to get the Fox News app

They also asked Johnson not to rely on Democrats to pass legislation that a majority of his own caucus does not support.

Norman said in comments to “The Story” that he believes Johnson now understands — through the initial silence of several Republicans during the first roll call and his and Self’s initial non-Johnson vote — that he will have to work. Consider the position of the conservative bloc.