Emmer manages GOP emotions as whip amid speculation about leadership ambitions |
Emmer manages GOP emotions as whip amid speculation about leadership ambitions
House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) has a naturally blunt demeanor, but he says a softer touch is the key to wooing rambunctious members in the super-slim House Republican majority.
“Human beings are very emotional animals. If you don’t manage the emotions, then you got cleanup to do,” Emmer said.
That was the task ahead for Emmer when he spoke to The Hill in late April, at the start of a week jam-packed with so many major bills sure to cause friction and looming deadlines that one member dubbed it “hell week.”
A number of Republicans made demands, and Emmer didn’t discourage them from voicing their positions: “I pretty much tell the members, say whatever you want.”
“This is an emotional thing. You got to get it out. Eventually, we’re going to get you back,” Emmer said. By the end of the bumpy week, all the measures in question passed.
The No. 3 House Republican is tasked with being the chief vote-counter and vote-getter for the House GOP legislative agenda under President Trump. His two terms as whip — and before that, two winning cycles as chair of the National Republican Congressional Committee — have allowed him to foster personal relationships across the ideological spectrum of the House Republican Conference, according to a dozen GOP lawmakers and aides who spoke to The Hill.
That has made him a top contender for a higher leadership position, should Republicans lose control of the House in November and Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) leave leadership.
And if not after November, as plenty of members have started to speculate, there is potential for him to rise up further in the future.
Emmer brushed off that chatter.
“I’d like to be the whip. We’re going to succeed in November, and I would love the opportunity to come back and get even better at this job,” Emmer said, adding that he gets “irritated” by those in politics who are planning for what they’re going to do next. “I didn’t come here to be somebody. I came here to do something.”
He pointed to a small sign on his desk in the style of one that once sat on former President Reagan’s: “There is no limit to what a man can do or where he can go if he doesn’t mind who gets the credit.”
Over the past year and a half, “doing something” has often meant late-night negotiations with holdouts in the Speaker’s office or keeping open a vote for hours as leaders work to flip members on the House floor. And sometimes, as with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act of Trump’s tax cut and spending priorities last year, it’s required bringing in the president himself as a closer.
That dynamic has earned Emmer some criticism. One Republican operative said Emmer was a “horrible whip.”
“Everything’s whipped by the White House or the Speaker,” the operative said.
White House Director of Legislative Affairs James Braid, though, had a different assessment.
“Tom Emmer has played a critical role in advancing the administration’s priorities, including delivering the largest tax cut in American history. His leadership and partnership have been instrumental in delivering key votes for the President, and he remains a great ally to the administration,” Braid said in a statement.
Trump has publicly praised Emmer as a problem-solver.
“When I have a problem I call him up and he gets it done. He’s a tough cookie,” Trump said of Emmer at the........