Scoop: House members want to make it harder to censure each other
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Rep. Don Beyer speaks to reporters outside the U.S. Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C., on March 17. Photo: Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg via Getty Images
House members in both parties are groaning about what they say is the out of control use of censure as a partisan tool — with one member even floating a proposal to raise the threshold for censuring his colleagues.
Why it matters: Censure was once the gravest rebuke the House could give to its members short of expulsion, but its use has exploded in recent years and it has become little more than a slap on the wrist.
- "I am in camp 'shut this shit down,'" Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.) told Axios of the growing use of censure. "We'll spend the next year censuring each other. It's bullshit. We need due process."
- House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told Axios he is "open" to a discussion about raising the threshold.
- "We don't want this to become commonplace," Johnson said. "It should be an extreme measure for extreme cases."
The latest: Reps. Don Beyer (D-Va.) and Don Bacon (R-Neb.) introduced legislation Thursday to raise the threshold to a 60% majority, according to legislative text obtained by Axios.
- In a letter to colleagues, Beyer and Bacon wrote, "These cycles of censure and punishment impair our ability to work together for the American people, pull our focus away from problems besetting the country, and inflict lasting damage on this institution."
- "We believe this is a sensible reform that would fix a broken process and raise the level of sanity in the House," they added.
- Beyer previewed his plans to Axios in an interview at the Capitol on Wednesday, saying he thinks "we're just using it as a partisan tool, which I hate."
Driving the news: The House voted Wednesday to refer a measure to censure Rep. Cory Mills (R-Fla.) and strip him of his committee assignments to the House Ethics Committee.
- The resolution, forced to a vote by Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), centers on allegations of domestic abuse, stolen valor and financial misconduct against Mills, all of which he denies.
- The vote was unusually bipartisan, with 204 Republicans and 106 Democrats voting to refer the measure to Ethics.
- The Ethics Committee announced an investigation into Mills on many of those same allegations just hours before the referral vote, making it effectively a vote on simply quashing the censure effort.
What we're hearing: Currently, the House only needs a simple majority to censure, and any member can force it to a vote. Beyer is actively working to gather support for his proposal to raise that threshold, Axios has learned.
- He added that some of his colleagues want to go even further and make it a two-thirds majority, which is currently the threshold to expel a member of Congress.
- A Beyer spokesperson told Axios the idea was "back-burnered earlier this year" but that they "picked it back up this week for obvious reasons."
Between the lines: Four censure resolutions have been floated in the last two days — including multiple against Mills.
- The House narrowly voted down a Republican censure resolution on Tuesday targeting Del. Stacey Plaskett (D-U.S. Virgin Islands) for texting with Jeffrey Epstein during a congressional hearing in 2019.
- Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.) said Wednesday he plans to force a vote on censuring Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (D-Fla.), who was indicted earlier in the day for allegedly stealing $5 million in FEMA overpayments.
What they're saying: Lawmakers in both parties told Axios they're interested in Beyer's idea.
- Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Texas) called it "reasonable," saying "it just seems like every other day we're doing it ... it's not healthy."
- Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.) told Axios it's a "smart" idea and that "people have had enough" of runaway censure votes.
The other side: Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.), who forced the vote on censuring then-Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) in 2023 for promoting the Steele Dossier, went to bat for censures in a brief interview with Axios.
- "There's some censures that are nonsense, and then there's some that are legitimate," she said.
Zoom out: Five House members have been censured in the last five years. All were in the minority party at the time they were censured.
- Reps. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) faced censure in 2021, Schiff and Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) in 2023, and Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) earlier this year.
- That is out of just under 30 censure votes in total since 1832.
- That figure doesn't include failed censure votes just this year against Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and LaMonica McIver (D-N.J.), both forced by rogue Republicans without support from GOP leadership.
The bottom line: "I would like us to get back to normal Congress," Johnson told Axios.
- "It's just," he added, "no one knows what that looks like."
Editor's note: This story has been updated with additional reporting.
