Democratic leaders blindsided by two members who bailed out Johnson

House Democratic leaders were blindsided by the two rank-and-file members who crossed the aisle on Tuesday to help Republicans advance a series of GOP messaging bills heading into the midterm elections.

Rep. Katherine Clark (D-Mass.), the Democratic whip, said she received no advance notice from either Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine) or Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-Wash.) that they intended to support a Republican rule governing the GOP bills.

“That came as a surprise,” Clark said shortly after the vote.

Clark said she has not spoken to the lawmakers since they cast their votes, but she was clearly frustrated with the pair for flouting an unwritten rule of House politics: The minority party virtually always unites against the majority party’s rules, even if members of the minority support the underlying legislation.

“It’s one of the rules of being on a team, is that we vote against the rule. So I’m sure we’ll have further discussions,” Clark said.

Asked if that would include any disciplinary measures, she steered clear.

“We’ll just have further discussions,” Clark said.

The aggravation emerged just as Democratic leaders were optimistic they could block the rule underlying a series of GOP messaging bills before the House leaves Washington to hit the campaign trail.

Among the bills are legislation to condemn socialism, punish universities that boycott Israel, and to amend protections for the North Atlantic right whale.

Five conservative Republicans voted against the rule, not because they oppose the underlying bills but as a protest against the decision by GOP leaders to pass a massive government funding bill without going through the normal rules process. That strategy allowed Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) to adopt the Senate-passed funding bill, known as a continuing resolution (CR), with broad bipartisan support, thereby avoiding a politically perilous government shutdown.

Those five GOP dissenters would have been enough to sink the rule on the Republican messaging bills if the Democrats had stayed united in opposition. Instead, the support from Golden and Gluesenkamp Perez put the measure over the top.

Golden has sponsored a version of one of the underlying bills, which is designed to protect lobstermen from economic harm due to the protections for the right whale.