Why more House members are getting kicked off committees The 5-Minute Fix author Amber Phillips is on parental leave, and Washington Post researcher Caroline Anders and reporter and editor Paige Winfield Cunningham are filling in. Send them a note any time on what you'd like to see in this newsletter. First, a correction: Yesterday's edition of the 5-Minute Fix referred to Idaho senator Mike Crapo, when it should have referred to former senator Larry Craig (R-Idaho). For most of history, kicking House members off committees wasn't a common practice. But it has happened a lot more in recent years, and we're seeing more of it right now: - Republicans are preparing to oust Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) from the House Foreign Affairs Committee, in part for using an antisemitic trope to suggest Israel's U.S. allies were motivated by money rather than principle.
- Yesterday, Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.), who has admitted to lying about key parts of his résumé, announced that he'll step down temporarily from his congressional committee assignments because "he's a distraction," a Republican lawmaker told The Post, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the private meeting. Santos maintains that leaving the committees was his choice.
But let's back up. Why do committee assignments matter? Historically, committees have been central to the way Congress allocates money and oversees the executive branch and private sector. There are more than 200 committees and subcommittees across the House and Senate, and they serve as a way to help Congress divvy up its responsibilities. Legislation tends to begin in committees, so it's beneficial for members of Congress to be seated on committees that align with their legislative interests. This can increase the odds that their proposed legislation gets a hearing. Some committees (like the appropriations committee, which allocates federal funds) are especially appealing to lawmakers because they offer nearly direct access to the government's purse strings or other important levers of power. How do leaders use committee assignments to keep members in line? Committee assignments are often used as a political tool. The leader of each party (in this Congress, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries) can grant or withhold desired assignments to reward or rebuke their members' conduct. There are exceptions to this. In the case of the House Intelligence Committee, which is responsible in part for national security, the speaker has final say on the panel's members. Traditionally, party leaders have only removed their own party members from committees as punishment. But Democrats changed the precedent last term by removing Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Paul A. Gosar (R-Ariz.) from their committees after both expressed support for violence against prominent Democrats in social media posts. This term, McCarthy followed suit. He has blocked Reps. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) and Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) from sitting on the Intelligence Committee, saying they are unfit to serve on the panel because of Schiff's work conducting the first impeachment investigation into former president Donald Trump and Swalwell's alleged ties to a Chinese spy. McCarthy has also rallied Republican support to remove Omar from House Foreign Affairs. Santos, who had been assigned to the House Small Business Committee and the Science, Space and Technology Committee, is facing multiple investigations into his biographical fabrications and campaign finances. Even so, Republicans may not keep him off committees forever: House Small Business Committee Chairman Roger Williams (R-Tex.) said his withdrawal is temporary, until the congressman is cleared in ongoing investigations. What will the end of the covid emergency declaration mean? President Biden announced this week that he will end on May 11 the national emergencies put in place to combat the coronavirus outbreak, marking a new phase of the government's pandemic response nearly three years after the virus first arrived in the United States. Ending the state of emergency will sunset numerous pandemic-era safety net policies and flexibilities that are tied to it, and the Biden administration and Congress are trying to gradually end those programs to avoid massive disruption. (Others, like expanded telehealth services, have been extended regardless of the status of the public health emergency.) While most American have been fully vaccinated against the coronavirus and life has largely returned to normal, an average of more than 500 Americans are still dying every day from the virus. So what will ending the emergency declaration do? Here are a few anticipated major effects: Title 42 ends: When the state of emergency ends, so will the Title 42 policy that has limited the inflow of migrants at the border. The Biden administration has tried to end the measure itself, but the program was held up in court. Some Republicans are opposed to ending Title 42, saying its termination would cause an insupportable influx of migrants to the border states. Millions lose Medicaid: As many as 16 million low-income Americans could fall off Medicaid when the nation's public health emergency ends, our colleague Amy Goldstein reports. In March 2020, the federal government offered states extra funds so long as they didn't kick anyone off of the program during the state of emergency. But that assurance means Medicaid caseloads have spiked about 22 percent nationally since the pandemic began, as new people have joined and no one has left. The uninsured pay for vaccines: States were given an option to provide uninsured residents temporary Medicaid coverage for vaccinations, testing and treatment which the federal government would reimburse them for. That practice will end with the emergency declaration, though most people with public and private insurance will still be able to get free coronavirus vaccinations. | 
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