Short Takes – 10-9-23

Tom Cole: McCarthy’s ‘cuts’ deal with conservatives now void. Politico.com article. Pull quote: “In the race to elect a new speaker, the dynamics are very different from McCarthy’s own election last January. Back then, GOP centrists were largely forgotten, and all the focus was on McCarthy’s tortured efforts to win over the last holdouts on the right. The dynamics now are different, in that the leading candidates are more to the right than McCarthy and will need centrists to prevail.”

Inside the bipartisan deal that might have saved Kevin McCarthy. Politico.com article. Pull quote: “Fitzpatrick said in a Fox News interview Friday morning that he had asked the group’s Democrats to vote present on a procedural vote, allowing Republicans to temporarily kill Rep. Matt Gaetz’s move against McCarthy. Gaetz (R-Fla.) would surely have tried again, he noted.”

Attack on Israel Raises Stakes for Republicans in Speaker Fight. WSJ.com article (free). Pull quote: “The party’s pick will then need to win a majority of the full House to become speaker, and it is unclear whether the Republican conference could avoid another drawn-out, grueling process. Some members have suggested that the GOP not leave its party meeting until almost all lawmakers are on board with the pick.”

Centrist GOP effort to reinstate McCarthy picks up steam after Israel attacks. Politico.com article. Pull quote: “Lawmakers are concerned that another drawn out speakership battle will delay action to aid Israel after attacks that sent America’s closest Middle East ally into a state of war. That’s time, these Republicans say, that they don’t have during a major emergency.”

Agencies can begin submitting congressionally mandated reports to online system this month. GovExec.com article. Pull quote: ““Our GPO teammates made great progress in developing the systems for federal agencies to comply with the new law and to begin the process of making these reports available to the public,” said GPO director Hugh Nathanial Halpern in a statement. “Having a one-stop location on GovInfo will provide the American people an invaluable opportunity to see information which was often not publicly available.””

SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket is about to become a workhorse for NASA. ArsTechnica.com article. Pull quote: “All told, we know of up to 10 Falcon Heavy missions on contract with SpaceX. Five of those are firm contracts with NASA's Launch Services Program, an office that procures launch services for the agency's robotic space missions, matching payloads with commercial rockets. Notable on this list is Europa Clipper, a $5 billion mission led by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory to explore Jupiter's icy moon Europa, an ocean world that may harbor environments conducive to life.”