The Salmon Rule
Rep. Matt Salmon (AZ-05) is laying down the gauntlet. In an op-ed published this morning in the Washington Times, Salmon is pledging to vote against House leadership’s rules.
From this point forward, I will vote against the rule for bills that increase spending without offsetting spending cuts and encourage my other conservative colleagues to do the same. Similarly, if House leadership brings any more bills to the floor without first securing the support from the majority of the GOP conference, I will take the same action. If enough of my conservative colleagues in the House join me, we can unilaterally put an end to the growth of government that is moving us closer to Greece-like fiscal calamities.
This should be called "The Salmon Rule" from now on. And let’s hope that his conservative colleagues join him in this pledge. In fact, the timing of this op-ed couldn’t have been better. Because in The Hill newspaper over the weekend, leadership is still willing to break the "Hastert Rule" – the idea that the House should only pass bills that have the support of a majority of House Republicans. Excerpt:
House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Sunday would not rule out passage of bills without the support of a majority of the chamber’s Republicans, saying only that Speaker Boehner (R-Ohio) was committed to finding GOP support for major legislation.
House GOP leadership has recently violated the "Hastert rule," named after former Republican Speaker Dennis Hastert (Ill.), which requires bills coming to the floor to have support from the majority of GOP members.
If you support Salmon, tweet this with the hashtag, #TheSalmonRule.