With the nation now ten days away from hitting a trite metaphorical cliff, people who claim fiscal superiority have blocked a procedural vote to protest a deal their Party leadership made with Senate Democrats and the White House, making it more likely that the government will have to pass another stopgap continuing resolution before the budget bargain can be passed.

According to the Washington Post, thirteen Republicans joined Democrats to sink the rule allowing the House to consider upcoming legislation, a vote that traditionally goes along Party lines.  By voting down the rule, the thirteen Republicans force the bills to go through longer parliamentary procedures.  While it won’t stop the inevitable, it delays the passage of the budget deal.

The last time this bloc of far-right Republicans undertook such a protest was immediately after Preacher of the House Mike Johnson took the gavel in November 2023, to protest his reliance on Democrats to pass a continuing resolution.  In June 2023, after then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy made a similar deal with the Biden White House, the far-right faction also blocked the required procedural vote.

It’s clear the far-right wing of the GOP caucus seeks only chaos before the election, refusing to allow anything that resembles normalcy.  During a Wednesday morning GOP conference meeting, Johnson was reportedly confronted by Freedom Caucus leader and man who didn’t see anything, officer, Jim Jordan, who demanded Johnson explain a rumored side deal for $69 billion and why Johnson withered when the Freedom Cult had demanded a $1.59 trillion spending cap.   Other Freedom Cult members were upset that the budget deal didn’t do enough to address border security issues.

“Look, leadership is tough. You take a lot of criticism. But remember, I am a hard-line conservative. That’s what they used to call me. I come from that camp,” Johnson said without acknowledging it’s his membership’s immaturity that makes leadership difficult. “To me, this deal, this agreement is a down payment on restoring us to fiscal sanity and is critically important.”