In the wake of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s stunning defeat, the leadership team in the Republican-controlled U.S. House went through a shakeup.
Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Cal.) rose from Majority Whip — the third-ranking member of the House — to become Majority Leader, which is second in command behind Speaker of the House John Boehner. Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.) succeeded McCarthy as Majority Whip.
Scalise’s election to the number three spot gave southerners a real voice at the leadership table for the first time since Barack Obama became president in 2008.
That was important because many southern Republicans had grown frustrated with southern-state congressmen being overlooked for leadership roles, in spite of the South being the GOP’s largest base of support on the national level.
Rep. Mike Rogers (R-AL03) was instrumental in propelling Scalise into House leadership. He organized numerous dinners with southern members in the months leading up to the House leadership elections to get them all on the same page. The week after Cantor’s defeat, Rogers organized meetings between leadership candidates and southern members of the House, helping the region flex its muscle. It paid off.
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This week, David Drucker of The Washington Examiner is out with a new piece titled “Battle cry of the South: Take over House GOP leadership,” detailing southern Republicans’ push to gain more power and influence inside the GOP caucus.
Here’s how Drucker set the scene:
Once a month for the last six months, a group of House Republicans from the South has gathered for dinner at RT’s Restaurant, an old-school Cajun joint across the river from Washington in Alexandria, Va.
There, in a dining room named for a former Republican congressman from Alabama, Herbert Leon “Sonny” Callahan, the “Southern Caucus,” as the group calls itself, has plotted its rise.
And leading this new Southern Caucus is none other than Alabama’s Mike Rogers.
“We’d like to see regional balance in chairmanships, something that used to be a factor in the Steering Committee and it hasn’t been for years and we’d like to get back to that,” said Rep. Mike Rogers, 56, the Alabama Republican who chairs the Southern Caucus.
It’s fitting that Rogers is the driving force behind the Southern Caucus and the group retreats at RT’s. The restaurant was a favorite haunt of Callahan when he served in Congress, and it was there that he hosted dinners for other Southern Republicans. Particularly after the 1994 midterm elections, when Rep. Newt Gingrich of Georgia led the GOP to its first House majority in 40 years and was elected speaker, Southern Republicans were a power center.
When Rogers took over host duties for the dinner last year, his goal was to reinvigorate influence the South has lost since. The group that coalesced into the Southern Caucus under his leadership was small, consisting mainly of members from Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and the Florida Panhandle. In recent weeks, the caucus has become more popular.
The Caucus now meets multiple times throughout each week to discuss their strategy, and their ranks have grown to include members from Arkansas, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee.
The group is said to be targeting several prime committee slots in the next Congress, including some of the top posts on Energy and Commerce, Financial Services, Rules, Ways and Means and Appropriations.
Rogers said the group is still in its formative stage and is trying to gauge what is “possible” and realistic,” but his influence growing in D.C. can only mean good things for Alabama going forward.
Follow Cliff on Twitter @Cliff_Sims
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