House Freedom Caucus Faces Controversy on Two Fronts

The head of the House Freedom Caucus has been engulfed in controversy over the past week, amid a move by the hardline conservative group to moderate its demand for steep government spending cuts.

On Wednesday, text messages from Scott Perry, the Freedom Caucus' chair, sent in the aftermath of Donald Trump's 2020 presidential election defeat, were made public by a court. They revealed Perry's involvement in discussions about overturning Joe Biden's victory.

The messages included a discussion with Jeffrey Clark, a Trump-appointed official at the Department of Justice, about getting him installed as attorney general. Perry also said there was credible information about irregularities in the Pennsylvania ballot. He asked whether "anyone in the senate has the courage to fight" against Biden's election win. In a statement provided to CNN, Jack Rowley, Perry's attorney, described the release of his messages as unfortunate.

Referring to Perry, Rowley said: "The communications reflect his efforts to understand real-time information about the 2020 election. They were confidential and intended to address critical business before Congress in service of his constituents."

Also on Wednesday, Perry told journalists that the Freedom Caucus is moderating its demands for sharp government spending cuts. He said the Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA) agreed earlier this year between President Biden and then speaker Kevin McCarthy was "the limit" for discussions.

"We are here to say we are going to fight for the American people. We have been fighting for them. This is how we are going to do it," he said.

"The first thing that needs to happen is, the spending in Washington, DC, is driving the cost of everything up. Now, it's still too much for many of us, but what's agreed to around Memorial Day was this FRA number of $1.59 trillion. No more gimmicks: Most of the House voted for it, most of the Senate voted for it. That's where we have to be. Don't be adding stuff on to it: let's write the appropriations bills, get the spending bills right, set that as the number."

He added, "Let's get the process started where the American people know what's being spent, know how their members vote, and know what it's being spent on."

Asked about the $1.47 trillion limit that had previously been called for, Perry said that caucus members accepted that $1.59 trillion "has to be the limit."

Texas Representative Chip Roy, a fellow member of the House Freedom Caucus, reiterated this message.

"Let's go work it through at a spending level at $1.59 trillion or lower. That's what we are saying. Do our job. I think what the Speaker is saying, if the Senate won't work with us to do that, the default position is going to put it at a pretty aggressive cut into the $1.5s [trillion] if the Senate is unwilling to do their job and do what we did in the House."

Republican Oklahoma Representative Tom Cole, vice chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, later said: "This is where I always thought we would end up. So, I'm not surprised that they understood that something that both houses had passed and the president signed was probably going to be the deal."

However, Thomas Gift, an associate professor who heads up the Centre on U.S. Politics at King's College London, U.K., told Newsweek that such recent controversies involving the House Freedom Caucus are not unusual, saying that "the occasional (or even frequent) slip-up is just the cost of doing business."

"The Freedom Caucus is all about generating chaos; torching the system, turning Washington on its head, and upending the normal rules of politics," he said.

Correction, 12/8/23, 12:30 p.m. ET: This article has been updated to remove references to James Comer, who is not a member of the House Freedom Caucus, and to add further information. The headline was also updated.