EDITORIAL: Congress Making a lame duck fly

Dec. 1—Today is the first day of the last month of the 117th Congress. Come the new year, a new Congress takes office, with a narrow Republican majority in the House replacing the current Democratic majority in that chamber.

That, coupled with the growing indications that the incoming House majority is not particularly serious about the art of legislation, sets up what figures to be a hectic December in the Capitol.

The lame-duck rush actually started Tuesday, when the Senate passed legislation establishing federal recognition of same-sex and interracial marriages. Such unions became legal nationally through Supreme Court rulings that are now jeopardized under the legal logic the court majority employed earlier this year in overturning abortion rights. The House passed a different version, so passing the Senate version will be prominent on the to-do list of outgoing Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

But there's more:

—Government funding: The continuing resolution that authorizes the operation of the federal government expires Dec. 16, so Congress has a little more than two weeks in which to avoid a shutdown.

—Defense and Ukraine: The Defense Authorization Act is still pending, with Kevin McCarthy, Pelosi's likely successor as speaker, trying to prevent its passage this year.

One crucial aspect of this legislation is American military assistance to Ukraine. While there will remain a sizable majority in Congress to sustain that aid, the internal politics of McCarthy's caucus complicates matters. No Republican can muster 218 votes to become speaker without the support of the worst elements of that caucus (the likes of Putin supporters Marjorie Taylor Greene, Paul Gosar and Matt Gaetz), and McCarthy has curried their support by signaling a pending reduction of aid to Kyiv.

Congress would do well to foreclose on such mischief now.

—Electoral reform and Jan. 6: The clock is ticking on both the Electoral Count Act and on the special House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.

The legislation, which would address the ambiguities in the 1887 law on the certification of the Electoral College votes that former President Donald Trump tried to exploit in his attempt to overturn the 2020 election, has been too long stalled. There is plenty of support on both sides of the aisle in both chambers to pass it, and it must be done now, for McCarthy will certainly bury it once he's speaker.

The Jan. 6 committee — which could not have continued into the 118th Congress in its current form even had the Democrats retained the majority —was still interviewing witnesses this week. While its public hearings are likely over, it must publish its report by year's end.

That's a substantial workload — made all the more daunting by the inevitable recess for the holidays.