Washington D.C., Nov 6, 2020 / 12:15 pm (CNA).- As ballots are still being counted to determine key House races, Democrats are projected to hold control of the chamber—but by a smaller margin. The shift could impact the Democrats’ priorities in the coming years.
As of Friday afternoon, ABC News had projected Democrats with 214 House seats and Republicans with 202.
House Republicans had gained a net total of six seats in the House and are looking to flip several more, in states such as New York, Iowa, and California where districts are either still counting ballots or may hold a recount. While Republicans had flipped eight seats, Democrats flipped two in Raleigh and Greensboro, North Carolina.
Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-N.J.) survived his re-election bid after he switched parties in 2019 and opposed the House impeachment of President Trump. He ended up signing a pro-life House petition on the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection bill.
Pro-life women candidates were responsible for much of the Republican gain on Tuesday. The number of pro-life women in the House has now “more than doubled,” said Mallory Quigley, vice president of communications for the Susan B. Anthony List, on EWTN Pro-Life Weekly on Thursday. The group’s 501(c)(4) had endorsed a number of women for 2020 House races.
Maria Elvira Salazar won in South Florida’s Miami-Dade County, Ashley Hinson flipped a district in Northeast Iowa, Yvette Herrell unseated a Democratic incumbent in Southern New Mexico, Nancy Mace won in coastal South Carolina, and Michelle Fischbach defeated Rep. Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) in Western Minnesota.
Peterson was known as a sometimes “pro-life Democrat” and was endorsed by Democrats for Life of America, although Susan B. Anthony List says his record was mixed.
Ballots are still being counted in other races around the country, and other GOP women candidates could continue to flip districts red. Mariannette Miller-Meeks holds a narrow lead of several hundred votes in Iowa’s second district, where a recount is expected. Claudia Tenney is ahead in New York’s 22nd district race.
As part of its overall campaign with Women Speak Out PAC, Susan B. Anthony List spent $52 million to target more than 8 million voters in 10 battleground states, knocking on doors, making phone calls, and running digital ads.
“I think this is a repudiation of Speaker Pelosi’s radical pro-abortion agenda,” Quigley told EWTN Pro-Life Weekly of the House gains. “Pro-life is a winning issue.”
The Republican gain comes after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) had predicted a double-digit gain of seats for House Democrats as part of an electoral sweep.
Now, with a slimmer majority, Democrats might reconsider some of their policy priorities—especially if Republicans hold on to control of the Senate.
As of Friday morning, Republicans were poised to hold 50 seats in the chamber with two runoff races in Georgia expected in January to determine ultimate control.
If Democrats were to expand their House majority and gain control of the Senate, along with winning the White House, a number of pro-abortion and pro-LGBT policies were expected to be considered. With a clear Democratic majority, the Senate would possibly be able to abolish the filibuster, requiring only a 50-vote majority to pass legislation. The chamber would also be able to move to expand the Supreme Court and negate any perceived Republican advantage there.
Now, with a more competitive House and a possible Republican Senate, that landscape may be altered. Speaker Pelosi and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden had both promised to repeal the Hyde Amendment and allow for taxpayer funding of elective abortions, but that measure might be much harder to pass through a Republican Senate.
Other more-controversial measures such as court-packing might now be dead-on-arrival, said National Review senior editor Rammesh Ponnuru on EWTN Pro-Life Weekly.
Pro-lifers, he said, “will be in striking distance” of a House majority and could obtain it by 2022.
Tuesday’s results also foreshadow a possible fight amongst House Democrats over policy priorities and messaging for the next two years—as well as a potential challenge to Speaker Pelosi’s leadership.
In a call with fellow House Democrats on Thursday, Pelosi reportedly insisted that Democrats had won and were given a “mandate” by voters. “We didn’t win every battle, but we won the war,” she said.
However, some Democrats on the call emphasized that the party must moderate its message. Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.) who represents a suburban district rated R+6 by the Cook Report and who is projected to survive her first re-election battle, insisted that the party change its tone especially on emphasizing issues such as “socialism” and “defund the police.”
Other young progressive congresswomen, however, said that the party need not abandon liberal priorities such as Medicare-for-All and the Green New Deal. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) tweeted on Friday that liberal policies were not the problem for Democrats.
Thursday’s call—and the ensuing debate—is a snapshot of a possible conflict among House Democrats in the next two years.
The issue of abortion is wrapped up in this fight. Proposals for Medicare-for-All would cover elective abortions in taxpayer-funded plans. Progressive House Democrats such as Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) have led efforts in recent years to repeal the Hyde Amendment, which bars taxpayer funding of elective abortions in health care appropriations bills.
The Equality Act, which the House passed in 2019, would set up sexual orientation and gender identity as protected legal classes; critics have said that the bill would infringe on the religious freedom of individuals and groups opposed to the LGBT agenda, and could possibly force health care workers to participate in abortions.
Other House races in doubt on Friday include heavily-Catholic districts in New York. Republicans could gain the state’s first and third districts on Long Island and Staten Island, while Catholic Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-N.Y.) could survive a challenge in his district on Long Island’s north shore. Suozzi has had an 100% rating from the pro-abortion group NARAL in the most recent Congress.
Suozzi helped bring Bishop Robert Barron to Capitol Hill last year to speak to legislators. He called Barron “a remarkable man who has inspired me and my wife and my family for many years.”
In Pennsylvania’s 17th district in the Pittsburgh suburbs, Catholic Rep. Conor Lamb (D-Pa.) is expected to win re-election over a Catholic Republican challenger, Sean Parnell. Lamb said in 2018 that on abortion, Catholics “believe that life begins at conception,” but “as a matter of separation of church and state, I think a woman has the right to choose under the law.” He said he would vote against a 20-week abortion ban.
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“The Holy See gave no reason for the decision.”
Is it just me, or does this seem a tad high-handed?
Doesn’t the Holy Father owe the Diocese of Arecibo an explanation? Is Bishop Torres a danger to his flock in any way?
And what are his fellow bishops supposed to read into his removal?
For a papacy that claims to be all about the synodality of synodality, taking such an action in a virtual vacuum appears altogether centralized and authoritarian.
It certainly seems that the Church — as, indeed, the world — is at a hugely consequential inflection point.
No, it’s not just you.
To the new disoriented clericalist elites, the Church is their centrally managed corporation, and they all work as regional managers for “the bouncer-in-charge” Pontiff Francis.
See Phil Lawler in Catholic Culture, Mar. 9.Gi
“I think that for quite some time many bishops have been watching with concern what is happening in the Church and we have resisted believing what is happening. Today more than ever we must remember our calling to be prophets” (Bishop Daniel Fernández Torres).
When faithful priests and bishops are persecuted by the Church we know something is terribly amiss. That a bishop seeking to safeguard his seminarians, affirming conscientious refusal of vaxx by member of his fold is censured and removed, while elsewhere Catholics are permitted license by bishops to receive the Eucharist when living in adultery and same sex relationships.
Are we approaching perhaps that final test of our faith? Men like Bishop Torres whatever transpires forge the path for us.
Blessings of peace and ever increasing wisdom.
Man is known by what he says and how he acts. Thank God for Bishop Daniel Fernández Torres and others of his ilk.
Romans 8:31 What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
Psalm 27:10 For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the Lord will take me in.
1 Peter 5:8 Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.
Philippians 3:13-14 Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
2 Corinthians 12:9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
Romans 15:13 May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.
Wasn’t Puerto Rico the place that shut down the Mass of the Ages rather precipitously?
“For a papacy that claims to be all about the synodality of synodality, taking such an action in a virtual vacuum appears altogether centralized and authoritarian.”
Curious. Bishops like Bill Morris in Australia were ejected from the episcopacy. Rome has always been about centralization and authoritarianism. The people complaining usually are allies, personal or ideological.
A bishop who refuses to collaborate with fellow bishops on a seminary, who bucks the trend in favor of public health and safety–that seems like more serious reasons than other bishops getting the pink slip.
It depends on whose ox is being gored.
There has to be more to the story than this.
If being a “traditionalist” and not being “collegial” are the reasons Torres was fired, there are quite a few bishops in the United States whose job would be on the line.
I think people who understand Spanish and have access to Puerto Rican media may be able to find out more information.