President Mike Johnson does not plan to authorize the new Democratic MP to take an oath until his party agrees to end the government’s closure, although he declared to CNN earlier on Tuesday that he would oath “as soon as she would like”.
“We will take an oath to the elected representative (Adelita) Grijalva as soon as the room returns in session, when Chuck Schumer, Mark Kelly and Ruben Gallego decide to open the government,” a management collaborator on Tuesday.
This decision is equivalent to an extraordinary power game aimed at refusing a siege to an in -office member.
While the management assistant argued that “it is a usual practice in the chamber to take the oath to the members when the chamber is in legislative session”, Johnson was sworn in to the representatives of the Florida GOP, Jimmy Patronis and Randy Fine, during a professional session this year.
While the government’s closure is exterior without the Senate being able to achieve an agreement to finance the government, the Chamber held brief “pro formal” sessions during which the Chamber is quickly released and is not engaged in legislative work.
Johnson, who was asked earlier on Tuesday why he had not taken an oath to Grijalva during a pro formed session during his election in September and if it was linked to a pressure to vote on the publication of the files of the Jeffrey Epstein case, replied: “No, it has nothing to do with that. We will oath when everyone is back.”
“Listen, we are going to program it, I suppose, as soon as she wants it. It has nothing to do with that. Me, we are in pro formal session because the room has nothing to do. The room did its job,” said the speaker when CNN asked him why he was waiting for the full room.
Grijalva is expected to provide the final signature necessary for a petition to force a complete vote of the Chamber on the publication of additional documents in the Epstein case, but Johnson insisted that the delay in his oath was not linked to this issue.
Johnson did not explain why he chose to delay his swearing in, even if he treated other members differently.
“President Johnson must stop hanging out and follow the same precedent he created by taking oath to his republican colleagues earlier this year. If he simply gave me a date and an hour, I will be there,” Grijalva said in a statement to CNN.
The new deputy, who won a special election two weeks ago, asked Johnson to provide him with a date for her swearing in, arguing in a letter addressed to the president on Monday that the delay “deprives the population of southern arizona of essential constituent services”.
Representative Jim McGovern, the highest democrat of the House Regulation Commission, told journalists in the Capitol on Monday that he was “scandalous” that Grijalva has not yet taken oath.
“It’s scandalous. The White House undermines our democracy. Now, the president of the room does the same thing. I mean, this is a continuation of Epstein’s concealment,” he said.
This story has been updated with additional details.
