Senate Democrat says he’d back empowering McHenry if he was still in House

Sen. Peter Welch (D-VT) said on Monday he would support empowering House Speaker Pro Tempore Patrick McHenry’s (R-NC) authority to get the chamber functioning again — if he were still serving in the House.

Welch, a former House lawmaker who won his Senate seat last year, made the comments while speaking to reporters outside the Senate floor after a pro forma session, where one member quickly gavels the chamber in and out. The Vermont senator was asked about a centrist push to expand McHenry’s powers on an interim basis.

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Asked if he believed Democrats should support empowering McHenry if a vote on the matter comes to the floor, Welch replied: “Well that’s up to them, but I would. I mean, I think that’s where we’re going to end up.”

Hard-line conservatives had dismissed the effort to hold a vote on expanding McHenry’s powers, which was led by a number of House Republicans before ultimately falling apart on Friday, as a bid to form a “coalition government” with Democrats, whose votes would be needed to approve the measure.

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With that effort stalled, nine House Republicans are now vying to win over the entirety of the GOP conference. Whether any of them can do so remains to be seen.

The House has been in a state of paralysis for nearly three weeks as Republicans spar over who should be speaker, a dispute that has left the chamber unable to govern. Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s (R-CA) ouster marked the first time in U.S. history that a speaker was removed from office, and each of the attempts to replace him, led by House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) and then House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH), have failed.