John Thune succeeds Mitch McConnell

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: It’s Thursday the 14th of November.

You’re listening to WORLD Radio and we thank you for listening. Good morning, I’m Myrna Brown.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard.

Up first on The World and Everything in It, Congress gets ready for a new term with new House members learning the ropes, and Senate Republicans electing new leaders.

Here’s Washington Bureau reporter Leo Briceno.

LEO BRICENO: Senate Republicans elected Mitch McConnell’s right-hand man to the top spot on Wednesday. South Dakota Senator John Thune.

THUNE: I promise to be a leader who serves the entire Republican Conference. We'll have an ambitious agenda and we'll take each and every Republican working together to be successful.

Thune is currently serving as party whip. That’s the number 2 position, responsible for getting party members on board ahead of floor votes.

After the closed-door election, Thune introduced his team.

THUNE: I'm excited to get to work with this team right away,

A couple other current team members are also getting promotions as Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso moved up to whip and West Virginia’s Shelley Moore Capito becomes Conference Chair.

New members of the team include Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton, Oklahoma Senator James Lankford, and South Carolina Senator Tim Scott. Scott will lead the committee responsible for helping Republicans get elected to the Senate.

SCOTT: My passion is making sure that we defend our current seats and expand the map and expand our majority so that President Trump has four years in control of making sure that America’s agenda comes home to each and every household…

The question now becomes how Thune and his team will manage the Senate’s newly elected 54-seat majority—and how far they’ll go to implement Trump’s agenda starting with his cabinet appointees. The President-elect wants the Senate to speed up the process through a tool called recess appointments. That allows the President to bypass the Senate when Congress is not in session.

Here’s what Thune had to say about Trump’s request:

THUNE: What we're going to do is make sure that we are processing his nominees in a way that gets them into those positions so they can implement his agenda. How that happens remains to be seen.

Thune then said Trump’s nominees will go through committee hearings and floor votes, but he didn’t rule out recess appointments.

THUNE: And obviously we're going to look at -- explore all options to make sure that they get moving, that they get moved quickly.

But concerning another one of Trump’s demands, Thune was clear.

PRESS: Will the legislative filibuster remain unchanged under your tenure?

THUNE: Yes.

In the past, Trump has called for an end to the filibuster, the rule that sets a two-thirds threshold for most votes…rather than a simple majority. Eliminating the filibuster would allow the majority party to get more legislation done, but Senator McConnell long resisted calls to change the rules…saying it requires lawmakers to work with members across the aisle. Thune echoed that view on Wednesday.

THUNE: The Senate, as you know, is a -- by the founder's design — a place where the minority has a voice in our process. And we will do the job that the founders intended us to do.

Where McConnell broke with President Trump on some issues during his first term, Congress watchers are waiting to see how the new Senate majority leader works with the president-elect.

THUNE: You know, maybe John Thune will end up being more of a, you know, mainstream Republican, you know, that could happen.

Mark Green teaches politics at the Catholic University of America. He thinks the four-seat majority gives new leadership a little more leeway to deal with dissenting voices.

GREEN: Democrats had a very narrow majority in the first two years of Biden’s presidency, but they had to deal with Manchin and Sinema…

West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin and Arizona Independent Kyrsten Sinema disagreed with Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on several issues, and prevented some legislation from passing.

GREEN: So, they often effectively had less than a majority. If they had 54, 55 seats they could have said ‘sure Manchin and Sinema vote however you want we don’t care. So, in this case I would look at the makeup of the Republican conference.

While the new Republican leadership team takes shape in the Senate, new members of the House of Representatives have started learning the ropes.

SOUND: [Activity outside hotel]

On Tuesday, Congressmen-elect from both parties began arriving for a week of orientation at a hotel a few blocks south of the Capitol. The lawmakers WORLD spoke with displayed enthusiasm, optimism, and an eagerness to engage—even in the biting November windchill. Or at least, chilly by D.C. standards

BYRAN STEIL: In Wisconsin we call this August.

That’s Rep. Bryan Steil of Wisconsin, the Republican chairman of the Committee on House Administration.

The committee deals with member services and part of that includes getting newly elected members up to speed on the ins and outs of legislating.

STEIL: A lot of information is coming at new members from an array of backgrounds. And in many ways, that’s the strength of the House—is that individuals, men and women, come from a whole host of backgrounds. But to really come in and try to absorb as much information as you can to be the best member and representative you can be of your respective district.

One of those new representatives is Republican Congressman Bob Onder from Missouri’s second congressional district.

ONDER: It’s an exciting time. We have a chance to make history in the next, in the first hundred days. We’re going to make our country great again.

Democrats are also looking forward to the next congress—even though they will be in the minority. Here’s Suhas Subramanyam, a new House Democrat from Virginia’s 10th congressional district.

SUBRANMANYAM: I vowed during my campaign to work with everyone, including Republicans and including a President Trump if that happened which it obviously did. I look forward to seeing what I can do for my constituents.

But that’s next year. For now, Subranmanyan and Onder are learning their way around.

ONDER: We’re just getting oriented, getting our technology, our phones our laptops really, it's just the beginning…Looking forward to getting oriented to the 119th Congress and getting to work in January.

Freshman lawmakers will take their oaths and their seats on January 3rd.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Leo Briceno in Washington, D.C.

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