‘Mad House’ reveals a functional disorder in the 118th congress: NPR

The 118th congress committee was elected in 2022 and served from 2023 to 2025.

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It is no secret that Capitol Hill is often scattered in partisan policy and fights, but a new book shows additional chaos that the public does not see. In Crazy house, Annie Karni and Luke Broadwater – both experienced reporters for The New York Times – Chronicle the 118. Congress committee, which was chosen in 2022 and served from January 2023 to January 2025.

Karni and Broadwater describe the 118th house as the first Maga-controlled congress, which has completely adopted extremism and the art of stage art of Trumpism. During its two-year session, the house only passed 27 bills, which became the law, the lowest number since the Great Depression.

Crazy house Chronicles, as the deputy Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) Was elected to the spokesman for the house after 15 rounds-10 months later. The notorious spit is also being revised, in which representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA.) And Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) exchanged personal barbens during a supervisory meeting of the House Committee. This special meeting took place in the evening, which, as Karni says, can be a particularly difficult time for legislative events.

Karni and Broadwater write that the Republicans in the 118th congress had a very close majority – with a handful of party members who often refused to do what the leadership wanted.

“If you have a tiny majority, every member can throw yourself in the mix and make yourself a decisive vote,” explains Karni. “And in the last congress there was oversized power of 20 … right -wing extremists.

Broadwater says that the current spokesman for the house, Mike Johnson (R-La.), Give his position to President Trump. “And you can see that at the moment with the way the house has decided not to assert itself as a co-equal government branch for Donald Trump, not to be a supervision of the administration and essentially make yourself a submissive branch,” added Broadwater.

With a view to the future, Broadwater predicts that we will see more dysfunctions of the congress than less – especially since “it looks like the voters actually like the punches”.

“A successful way to win primary on the right is to be the loudest, the fighter, the most extreme,” explains Broadwater. “What we are now seeing in the Democratic Party is that the Democrats have a wish among the population to become more of the party of the struggle and not the party that plays according to Robert’s rules and keeps things super professional.”

Karni agrees: “If you look back now, I have the feeling that when you want to understand the moment we are nearby, it will really be brought from these characters from 118th congress.”

Interview highlights

Crazy house

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For members of the congress who sometimes sleep in their offices instead of renting an apartment in Washington, DC,

Karni: Many people cannot have two residences, and office sleep is a long -term thing. It became less popular in Covid and after the Metoo movement because it is an unpleasant thing to live in your office and go to employees in the morning and brush her teeth. But people still do it to save money.

Broadwater: It is extremely expensive to live in DC, and then you have a family at home and probably a house or mortgage or at least an apartment at home. And so they have two residences and it will be unsustainable for them to deal with a salary, unless they are independent of what many members of the congress and many senators are extremely wealthy. But if you are someone like AOC (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) or someone else who comes from smaller funds, it will be quite difficult.

About burnout among members of the congress

Karni: It is a slog for these house members. First, there is a trip. I mean, you are back and forth every week. If you live all over the country, the jet lag and the journey is only destroyed. Then there is no family. … that demands a tribute. … the physical violence and the threats have grown. I mean, these members are in constant threat of violence and they have no protection. If you want protection, you have to pay for it yourself from your campaign. Not to mention that you are traveling all of this and have no regular family life and are threatened. And then you look at it and you are like: “For what? If we are here, the house floor is frozen. We are not correct. Many people simply did the calculation, it is simply not worth it.

On the left side, Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) criticizes for his reaction to the current Trump administration

Karni: I think at the moment Chuck Schumer has become the Boogeyman of the Democratic Party among the ranking house democrats and among voters because they only have emotions and frustration in doing only more to do and defend themselves. And this is because he agreed with the Republicans last week to ward off a government shutdown. If the Democrats had not come to the Republicans in the Senate, we would be in a government injury. And Chuck Schumer defended this decision last week and said that that would have been much, much worse. Elon Musk and Donald Trump wanted to switch off. It would have enabled them to decide which programs are essential and not essential, and therefore never bring them back. His example, about which he talked about a lot, is Snap, Food Stamps. They could simply say during a shutdown: “This is not essential.” And there is no court check during a shutdown. That could just disappear.

About the relationship between Republicans in the current congress and Elon Musks Doge Task Force

Broadwater: For me it looks like they are very hugging Elon Musk and his mission. Each chamber has set up its own Doge Caucus and tried to implement its cuts into their various spending plans. When he comes to Capitol Hill, he passed on his private cell phone number to the members. He tried to say people individually. And he poses for pictures. But Elon Musk, his surveys are much lower than that of Donald Trump. The public in general does not feel the same as they feel Trump as with Elon Musk. And I think democrats focus on him as their best goal. He was not chosen. He is extremely rich. You know that there is a lot of populist trouble against the rich. And so when the richest man in the world, who has all these contracts with the federal government, is opening up the work of regular workers – and there is federal workers not only in DC, but throughout the country – they can see how this could be a strong political weapon for democrats.

Sam Briger and Susan Nyakundi produced and worked on this interview for the program. Bridget Bentz, Molly Seavy-Nesper and Meghan Sullivan have adjusted it for the web.