Kosar is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. He is the co-editor of “ Congress Overwhelmed: Congressional Capacity and Prospects for Reform ” (University of Chicago Press, 2020). He hosts the Understanding Congress podcast.
The other day, George Santos (R-NY) took to X (formerly Twitter) to decry his enemies and victimization. Part of the tweet said, “What the “ethicscommittee” did today was not part of due process, what they did was poison the jury pool on my ongoing investigation with the DOJ. This was a dirty biased act and one that tramples all over my rights.”
He went on to say he will be holding a press conference on November 30th at 8:00AM on the Capitol steps.
While jawing about this weirdness with a former Hill staffer, I wondered, “How will Santos exit the chamber?”
He already has said he is not going to run for reelection.
The House of Representatives may vote to expel him today November 29th. (The most recent effort failed by a vote of 179-213 —with 19 legislators voting “present” on November 1.) The recent Ethics Committee report is damning. Representatives who previously felt that due process and fairness necessitated that they reserve judgment now are free to drop the hammer.
So how will Santos respond to that vote once he knows it is coming? He could go gently into the night. He might give a farewell speech like Ohio Democrat James Traficant did in 2002 after he got the boot.
Or Rep. Santos instead might torch the House. Specifically, what if he demanded recognition the moment the House of Representatives restarted and raised a question of privilege to vacate the speakership?
Wait, you ask, why would he do that?
Answer: Why not? As the above tweet and his other public declarations make clear, he feels betrayed and scorned. Santos has every reason to fight and keep up the act that he is a victim. Additionally, vacating the Speaker would delay the vote on his own expulsion— no Speaker means the GOP would leave the floor to huddle in conference and figure out who is in charge. And if past is a prologue, that could take a while. Not to be forgotten is that pulling this maneuver would be sweet revenge on his party for scorning him.
And, obviously, trying to vacate the chair would make for great theater, and Santos is all about drama.
So what would happen if Rep. Santos gave it a whirl?
Now, the motion to vacate (MTV) is privileged, so it cuts the line in front of other legislative business. The Speaker might respond to Santos’ question by refusing to recognize him, but that may well fail. If ignoring a cranky member was a real option the chair could have ignored Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) when he rose to vacate Speaker Kevin McCarthy.
And then the chair would need to rule on the validity of Santos’ question, and he would presumably have to rule in the affirmative. Again, if this question was legitimate for Gaetz to ask then it would be fine for Santos to do the same.
Presumably, all Republicans present if asked would be against tossing out Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA).
But what about Democrats? Would they vote with Santos to stick it to Speaker Mike Johnson, vote no to save Johnson, or vote present and let the GOP thwart Santos. Obviously, they would feel some incentive to dump Johnson, seeing as the liberal base has been decrying Johnson as an election-denier and Christian nationalist.
Indeed, having made Johnson a bogeyman, Democrats have little reason to vote against vacating the chair, since their most fervid primary voters and donors would scream. If a GOP conservative stalwart can draw a primary challenger for refusing to oust McCarthy, then a Democratic legislator can earn a primary challenge for helping Johnson survive.
That leaves the option for Democrats to stay away from the chamber or to vote present, which would keep Santos from dumping the Speaker and delaying his expulsion. But would they? Certainly, they did not choose that course of action when their bete noire Rep. Gaetz drew his long knife for McCarthy. Instead, Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) decided it was advantageous to vote to dump the gentleman from California.
The prospect of George Santos temporarily shutting down the House to save his own hide is a troubling one. Thankfully, after further thought and consultation with a maven of House legislative procedure, I found peace. No, Rep. Santos can’t torch the House.
Sure, he can try, but it would fail.
Here’s why.
First, “House Rule IX states that under most circumstances, a Member must give notice of his or her intention to raise a question of the privileges of the House. Within two legislative days of giving such notice, the Member will be recognized to offer the resolution,” as the Congressional Research Service notes. Rep. Santos has made no such notification.
Second, a new privileged motion to expel Santos already has been introduced, and the Speaker may treat it as first in line.
Third, even if Santos had informed the House of his intention before the chair of the Ethics Committee gave notice, the Speaker does not have to consider them chronologically.
Fourth, so long as the House GOP can get enough of their members to show up and vote to table the motion or to vote against vacating, Santos’ effort would be thwarted.
Thus, if Santos pulled this stunt he nonetheless would be voted out before action could occur on MTV.
Which is a relief. The House and the country do not need another Speaker deposed. There is too much important work to do.
But the possibility that this scenario could have arisen should spur the House GOP to change the MTV rule. That any aggrieved GOP member —say someone retiring because he is sick of the dysfunction or a legislator who gets primaried— can bring down the House is a huge and needless vulnerability. The bar should be higher for a motion that disrupts the continuity of government.
Santos has said he would hold a press event after Thanksgiving. He will not be able to vacate the chair to stave off expulsion, but his farewell probably will be anything but demure.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
____
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.