On the first day of the new Congress, Georgia's 10 House Republicans each declined to join a public revolt against Speaker John Boehner.
A week later, several of the most conservative Republicans in the chamber moved to create a new splinter group to push the caucus further to the right, but no Georgians were among them.
In previous years, you would expect to find Georgians among the House’s hard-right agitators. But the state’s remade GOP House delegation — which features four new faces — has so far sent a different message.
It comes at a time when the state lost decades of seniority in the House and Senate, including well-placed senior members with influence over military and agriculture policy.
“There’s a general recognition that, heck, we lost a lot of power and now there’s no backstop,” said Andrew Dill, a Washington-based lobbyist for the University of Georgia. “If we don’t do this, there’s no one who can save us. So we can’t afford to be on the island throwing bombs.”
The united front for Boehner was noticed with approval in the speaker’s office but pilloried by tea party adherents in Georgia. Freshman U.S. Reps. Jody Hice of Monroe and Barry Loudermilk of Cassville, in particular, were targeted because they had vowed during their campaigns to oppose Boehner.
“I’m hoping it’s a learning experience for the freshman congressmen because they need to realize they work for us — the people,” said Lori Pesta, the president of the Republican Women of Cherokee County. “They need to realize if they are going to make a decision that counteracts what the people want, they are going to have a problem.”
Hice and Loudermilk, who were taken aback by the response, pointed out that they did vote against Boehner in a closed-door House GOP meeting in November, when he was re-elected by voice vote and no one ran against him.
U.S. Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, a Coweta County Republican, was among those hoping the delegation would be unanimous for Boehner.
“I was just really proud of those guys that they showed the maturity that they did,” Westmoreland said of Loudermilk and Hice.
Boehner did not have a serious floor challenger, but the situation was the same two years ago when then-U.S. Rep. Paul Broun, an Athens Republican, cast a protest vote for former Congressman Allen West.
Broun was Georgia’s most prominent anti-leadership vote, breaking away even on routine procedural matters. When Broun decided to run for Georgia’s open U.S. Senate seat, he often joked that he had three votes because Senate-seeking U.S. Reps. Jack Kingston and Phil Gingrey had to follow him to the right.
They all lost to businessmen David Perdue, who was sworn in this month as the state’s junior senator.
Kingston, one of the top members on the Appropriations Committee, was a go-to guy for Georgia’s military installations and agriculture policy. Former Georgia Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss, who served on the Armed Services Committee, filled that role in his chamber.
Perdue did not get an Armed Services seat, breaking a long streak for Georgia. Perdue had vowed during the primary campaign not to vote for Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., as Senate majority leader, but McConnell was elected in a unanimous closed-door voice vote in November.
No one from Georgia was named to the ultrapowerful House Energy and Commerce Committee after the state had two slots in the previous Congress. Committee decisions were made after Hice, Loudermilk and U.S. Rep. Rick Allen of Evans said they voiced “no” votes against Boehner.
Meanwhile, other Georgia Republicans are rising to more prominent roles.
U.S. Rep. Tom Price of Roswell is now the Budget Committee chairman, the first Georgia Republican ever to head a full committee. U.S. Rep. Tom Graves of Ranger snagged a spot on the Appropriations subcommittee on defense spending — making him the likely new point person for the state's eight major military installations.
Boehner can — and did, in the case of two rebels — strip members from certain committee assignments. His allies also can squeeze members' fundraising.
“Any time someone is not hard-core way off the reservation, they’re going to raise more money,” said Ted Burnes, the director of the political action committee for the American College of Radiologists trade association.
“To us, we don’t care (about the speaker vote) unless it’s a reflection of other horrible behavior. But if they’re good for us, and as long as they don’t become completely irrelevant, we’ll support them,” Burnes said. “But if they start getting kicked off committees…”
The freshmen still are figuring out how to navigate the Capitol’s hallways, much less its tricky internal politics. They will face difficult votes as the House tries to come together with a less conservative Republican-run Senate to prove they can govern.
Among the Georgians who have been around longer, Graves’ path is instructive.
Elected to Congress in the 2010 tea party wave, Graves ran in late 2012 as the more-conservative choice to lead the conservative Republican Study Committee and lost. In 2013 he was a key ally of U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, in bringing Republicans together to challenge Obamacare as part of a spending showdown. The result was a partial government shutdown that ended with no gain for Republicans.
But since then, Graves has formed a closer relationship with House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif.
As he has risen on the Appropriations Committee, Graves has angered the right with his support of spending bills that drew objections from conservative pressure groups. Graves' score with one of those groups, Heritage Action for America, was 97 percent in the 112th Congress but dipped to 80 percent in the 113th — though he's still well above average for a House Republican.
So when a group of hard-right members started talking about splitting off from the Republican Study Committee to challenge House GOP leaders more forcefully, Graves declined.
“I typically like to try to influence from being a part of something,” he said, rather than breaking away.
Jason Pye, a libertarian-leaning Georgia Republican activist who now works for the tea party-driven FreedomWorks, said he hopes some Georgians eventually do join the new splinter group.
“I do see a delegation that is very willing to go along with what leadership wants to do without questioning them,” Pye said. “I think it’s bad for the House Republican conference. I think a little bit of dissent or even disruption is healthy, despite what leadership may say.”
The delegation’s message: They can be relevant and pull leadership in a more conservative direction.
Last week the House voted to block several of President Barack Obama’s executive actions on immigration as part of a funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security.
U.S. Rep. Doug Collins, a second-term Gainesville Republican who might get a primary challenge from a local radio host because of his Boehner vote, had pushed for attacking immigration quickly in the new Congress after punting during the lame-duck session.
“I had meetings with and conversations over break with Leader McCarthy,” Collins said. “This is one of the things that we emphasized and we said over and over: We need to do this early. Let’s start this process early. I think they listened. Frankly, it’s a good sign of leadership listening and acting.”
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