Speaker Mike Johnson may hold the top job in the House, but he is an anesthesiologist from Queens who could soon become its most powerful member.
Rep. Andy Harris, who has represented Maryland's Eastern Shore since 2011, gained attention in September when he became chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, the most conservative bloc of the Republican Party.
With Republicans holding a slim majority, a notoriously finicky group of 20 to 30 Republican spending hawks could wield tremendous power over President-elect Trump's legislative agenda.
Harris, 67, is an avid supporter of MAGA, but he told the Post that he and his members want to put a stop to runaway government spending.
“Whether that new spending comes in the form of tax cuts or actual new spending, like building a border wall, is another matter,” Harris said, sitting in her fifth-floor office at the Longworth House building in Washington, D.C. I explained. Three Bibles and a Bible are kept there. A portrait of Jesus painted by his mother. “We can't have a net increase in the deficit, so we'll have to offset it.”
“We did it in Mr. Trump's first term, and we will do it in his second term if necessary,” he added.
The eight-term Republican was quick to add that he doesn't expect any major friction with the White House and that he believes the concerns of lawmakers will be taken seriously.
In a 75-minute conversation with the Post, Harris expressed confidence in Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy and their new Department of Government Efficiency.
“The first pass would just be to look at the efficiency of the existing workforce given the existing workload. Both he and Vivek were in corporate America, so they know that every company has to do that. I understand that,” Harris said.
The doctor supported President-elect Trump's push for Greenland.
“Greenland is rich in natural resources, and I think it could be very useful for both economic security and military security,” Harris said. “Greenland has been moving towards independence from Denmark for the past century. I don't see why we can't just move them further in our direction and away from Europe.”
Like many conservatives, Ms. Harris has been critical of Mr. Trump's pick for Secretary of Labor, Oregon Rep. Lori Chavez Delemer, whose nomination was supported by Teamsters President Sean O'Brien. Ta.
“I don't think her record in Congress is consistent with mainstream Republican thinking on labor issues.”
He didn't know what to make of President Trump's 11th-hour attempt to pass a bipartisan bill forcing the Chinese company ByteDance to leave TikTok. The company is widely seen as a national security threat due to its ties to the Chinese Communist Party.
“I don't understand . . . My first instinct was that he would agree that our relationship with the Chinese Communist Party is dangerous,” Harris said.
The Freedom Caucus does not release official membership numbers, but Harris said the group has between 20 and 30 members, more than enough to play kingmaker in the coming 2025 budget fight.
Mr. Trump gathered with Mr. Harris and members of the Freedom Caucus at Mar-a-Lago on Friday night, perhaps in anticipation of their influence to come.
An 11th-hour funding deal to keep the government open in December only lights up through March. At that point, you will need to find a new funding solution.
“We expect them to have a big impact,” said Dave Blatt, a former Virginia congressman and former member of the Freedom Caucus who now works at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia. spoke. “The Freedom Caucus' position reflects the position of the American people, especially those who voted for President Trump.”
Harris, 67, is from Laurelton, Queens, a 20-minute drive from Trump's childhood home in leafy Jamaica Estates.
The graduate of Regis High School, an elite Catholic prep school in Manhattan, said he didn't miss the city's good old days.
“I remember getting on the train one morning, and there was literally a dead person on the train, and that person had obviously been there for a while, because the car It really smelled like no one was on board,” Harris recalled.
Harris studied medicine at Johns Hopkins University and Hospital in Baltimore, where he served as an associate professor for nearly 30 years. He has lived in Maryland since 1975.
