GOPs

WASHINGTON — After a generation of comfortable Democratic majorities in the House, Republican congressmen seemed resigned to life in the minority–until Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) and the Congressional Opportunity Society began using House rules to wage guerrilla war against the entrenched leadership.

Dismissed at first as gadflies and ideologues, the young Republicans gradually developed political muscles. Two landmark events marked their coming of age: the resignation of Speaker Jim Wright following Gingrich-backed charges of ethics violations, and the election of Gingrich as whip, the second-ranking post in the House minority leadership.

Gingrich’s rise to prominence coincided with a major change in Washington’s political climate. In the 1980s, Washington was a town with clearly marked ideological divides. Issues such as Nicaragua and abortion dominated the agenda; battle lines were clear. The 1990s look quite different. With communism in retreat, the old foreign-policy battles no longer seem so important. After 10 years of a GOP White House, conservatives seem less opposed to strong government, and liberals less committed to it.

In retrospect, Gingrich’s call for sanctions against South Africa’s minority-white government seems a turning point in the emergence of the still unsettled Washington picture. Here was a leading conservative taking a position closer to that of Jesse Jackson than Margaret Thatcher.

If Washington has changed as the result of Gingrich’s challenges, Gingrich is changing as he becomes part of the Washington Establishment he once scorned. Like many political challengers before him, Gingrich seems to be finding that Establishments aren’t so bad–once the club lets you in.

This shift may cause him trouble down the road–Hell hath no fury like a right-wing scorned–but for now Gingrich has the best of both worlds: the support of conservatives and, increasingly, the respect and even friendship of moderates and some liberals.

During a relaxed and casual meeting, Gingrich seemed eager to talk about history and ideas. At times he seemed more like a popular college history teacher–a job he once held–than a powerful member of the congressional leadership. He seems comfortable with himself and his ambitions; confident of making his mark and willing to run risks.

He also has a quality that is rarer in Washington than it should be. For all the huge egos in Washington, there are relatively few people who see themselves against the backdrop of history. Gingrich is one. Men like Theodore Roosevelt and Winston Churchill are often in his speech–perhaps this says something about the scale of his ambition. That both these men were mavericks who changed parties and allies during their careers says something else about Gingrich. He will be hard to pin down in the political battles of the future–his loyalty seems given more to a vision than to people or parties.

Question: What is your foreign-policy vision for the United States?

Answer: Well, I think first of all you have to start with the presumption that there are three huge changes under way. There’s the rise of the true world market, where competitiveness and the speed of information flow and ease of transportation means that you are beginning to be connected internationally in the sense that in the 19th Century you had a national economy.

Second, there is the spread of the technology of destruction in such ways that you’re going to have, by the end of the century, places like Iraq, Iran, Libya and Syria that are capable, at a minimum, of threatening European cities with ballistic missiles and chemical and nuclear warheads. By the year 2000 to 2010, they may be able to attack the United States directly. That is a whole level of combat and conflict that we are not used to.

Third, you are living through a fundamental change in the Soviet empire. This clearly destabilizes the whole planet in the sense that for 45 years we had a bipolar world, with a Western coalition containing the Soviets . . . .

You have to start with a fundamental reassessment of America’s role, as decisive in some ways as the late ‘30s decision to commit us to stopping Japan and Germany or as decisive as the late ‘40s decision to contain the Soviet empire.

But we’ve got to reformulate a new image of where the planet is going. What does America want in the world–and then what is America’s role in trying to get it?

Q: It’s interesting that you mentioned those two periods, the ‘30s and the ‘40s, as times of great change because in both those times the conservative movement tended to take a more isolationist stance.

A: If you go back before 1937 and 1938, conservatism, from say 1860 to 1928, was the internationalist movement. And it was the Democrats, the (William Jennings) Bryan wing of the Democratic Party that was isolationist . . . .

Then, beginning in the ‘20s, you had a role reversal. And as the conservatives became less the government and more oppositional, they also became less internationalist and more isolationist. What you had, beginning with Eisenhower, and Nixon in all fairness–Nixon was one of the people who voted for the Marshall Plan–you had the emergence of first, an internationalist anti-communist Republicanism and then under Reagan and Bush that has broadened . . . .

I think that today there is much more isolationism in the Democratic Party than in the Republican Party . . . (where) there’s much more internationalism and much more of a commitment to the world market . . . .

Q: How would you define the differences between your view and that of the Democratic Party?

A: Well, there’s a difference about the question of safety, a difference about the question of international competition and a difference about the speed of transition–if I can break them down like that.

First of all, safety. The liberal Democrats basically are myopically focused on Central Europe and on Gorbachev, and their basic theme is, since Gorbachev seems to be succeeding and Soviet power seems to receding from East Germany, the world is safer. Therefore, we can demilitarize.

I would argue that we’re caught in the tragic irony that the curve, if you will, of threat from Iraq, Iran and Syria is rising at a rate about as fast as–or faster than–the curve of Soviet threat is declining . . . .

Now the question I would pose is: Is the world still going to be dangerous–even if Gorbachev succeeds? My answer would be yes. In fact, the world’s going to be more dangerous than people think. Dictators are going to have higher-power weapons that are more sophisticated than people think. And some of these dictatorships are very big. The Syrian Army has more artillery than the American Army. So when you say, “Gee, we can shrink dramatically,” my answer is fine–if you’re willing to allow the Iraqis to threaten American cities without SDI. If you’re willing to allow the Iraqis and the Iranians to seize the oil fields, and if you’re willing to give up Israel . . . . And I think most of my Democratic friends on that are just sophomoric. I don’t think they’d even look at the data base, because it conflicts with their ideology.

And the second big question is the world market . . . . The bureaucratic welfare state and permissive attitudes are incapable of competing in the world market. The correct answer is to reform and revitalize America, not to retreat . . . .

And I think a lot of my Democratic friends, because they have to bear the burden of the public-school bureaucracy in the inner city, and they have to bear the burden of the big-city machines, and they have to bear the burden of union work rules–their reaction is to say, “Gee, we have to find ways to withdraw from the world market, and to somehow build a self-sustaining America.” I think that’s crazy and I think in the long run it means a lower standard of living and fewer jobs for Americans.

Lastly, there is the question of speed. I thought it was almost funny that George Mitchell and Dick Gephardt decided that George Bush wasn’t moving fast enough. If you look historically over the Bush Presidency and you look at the change in Panama, Nicaragua, East Germany, Hungary, Poland . . . this has been unbelievable . . . .

I say this: I’m a conservative and I’m willing to criticize George Bush, and I voted to override on the Chinese student veto, but I have to say overall that they get A-plus marks on managing a transition of unbelievable complexity. And getting freedom further in 18 months than anyone would have thought possible.

Q: Among the Soviet Republics, Lithuania is an easy call in that we never recognized the annexation, but then you start looking at other separatist movements–including Russia. Isn’t there a fear of a nuclear Lebanon in the Soviet Union?

A: You have a fear of the unknown there. You’ve also got to recognize objective realities. There’s an Indian reservation in northern Vermont that claims it’s not in the United States. Now what if Gorbachev decided next Thursday to recognize it? I mean, you’ve got to decide, all right, what are the ground rules here. The Soviet Union does exist . . . . I think it’s now an empire in transition, but it exists. And it is going to have to decide inside itself how it allows itself to dismember. If they adopt a rule that says if the Georgians vote 70% to secede, that is frankly a more open rule for withdrawal than we have in the United States . . . .

Of course, if Russia does declare itself independent or sovereign it will be the first time that the mother country declared herself free from the empire. So it would be a dramatic change. And I think our position is that all of these republics have the right of self-determination and we would certainly encourage the Soviet government to tolerate and negotiate with all of these republics.

Q: As an American Georgian, you would know that.

A: Yeah, that’s right. I mean, we Georgians, we’ve already had this argument. Now, you can make the argument in their case that it wasn’t a voluntary collection (of republics); it’s the late 19th Century empire. That’s a good argument. But you are seeing Gorbachev take what is, after all, a pretty radical position and saying, look, we’re going to figure out a legal formula for you to get out of here. Well, that’s pretty amazing . . . .

And I think it’s a little unfair to say yeah, he did all that, but boy now I have this new excuse to get mad at him. And as long as he doesn’t use military force, it seems to me that we owe him the opportunity to try to lead his own country to sort itself out . . . .

Q: How is the Administration responding?

A: Well I think that the decision by the Soviet government to open up some economic activity in Lithuania is a victory for Bush. And I think if he can continue to encourage and nudge Gorbachev in the direction of re-establishing economic patterns with Lithuania, I think it will be a very big plus for him.

Q: Earlier you remarked that, in talking to the President about Lithuania, you said we need Winston Churchill, not Stanley Baldwin. Does that still apply?

A: Well, I think the President convinced me that it wasn’t the same kind of situation; that who we may need is George Bush, and that, in fact, he is negotiating and maneuvering his way through a very complicated situation with considerable skill.

Q: OK, let’s talk now about some of the global economic issues, because I think it’s clear to all of us that they are going to be dominant. Some people think that the economic competition among the former Western allies may become very, very fierce. Do you?

A: Not necessarily fierce, but it will become intense. But . . . it’s not that we’re competing for the same pie. We’re competing to build bigger bakeries . . . . The world market is extraordinarily underdeveloped and there is an enormous amount of money to be made over the next century helping the entire planet achieve a high standard of living. So there ought to be intense competition for how we build the bigger bakery. But we don’t have to have any kind of competition over who gets bread, because everybody ought to be getting bread . . . .

Q: Do you think that the world economy is breaking up into blocs or that there is a danger of this?

A: There’s a permanent danger of breaking up into blocs, but I wouldn’t exaggerate that. I think there is much, much more to be gained in the long run by actively building global countries and global companies. We are much better off to have more IBMs and more General Motors and Fords and AT&Ts; that are able to be everywhere. And we’re much better off to have thousands of new, small businesses that compete everywhere a jet airplane goes, and anywhere a fax machine can receive their latest advertisement. And I think we want to encourage this, more than anybody else, because we are perfectly suited for the world economy.

Q: More than any other country?

A: More than any other country. I mean geographically, we can reach both Europe and Asia simultaneously and Latin America. And in terms of our own cultural background. We are the only universal country of the planet, the only country that has people from everywhere. And therefore, we ought to be the advocates of the widest global market.

Q: Does that suggest the possibility that other countries may not be as enthusiastic for this as we are–for example, Europe?

A: They may not be. I mean, the Europeans don’t even have a real concern about that. On the other hand, the Europeans need us to balance off the Germans . . . . The price of having a market of nations that really do compete with each other, is that you have got to be able to sit down for long negotiations, and you just have to go in and tough it out.

Q. This sounds a lot like what used to be called liberal internationalism in the 1940s. So is it true that the liberalism of today is the conservatism of tomorrow?

A. Could be. I think that it’s that and an ongoing sense of thesis, antithesis, synthesis to some of that . . . . But if you would have interviewed a Democrat back in 1948, he would have said, “Gee, this sounds like Theodore Roosevelt.” Theodore Roosevelt’s wing of the Republican Party has consistently been the dominant dynamic in American life for most of the last century.

Q: So would you say Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, Newt Gingrich is the line of succession?

A: No . . . . To be honest, I’d say Roosevelt, Roosevelt, Reagan. It’s important to remember that Reagan was an FDR Democrat, and that when the Democratic Party moved to the left, Reagan left.

A slew of online discourse unfolded last week after Turning Point USA spokesman Andrew Kolvet shared that a college-aged member of the conservative nonprofit told him, “A burrito shouldn’t cost $20.”

“Yeah, a lot of this is a hangover from COVID and Biden-era inflation, but the lived experience is the same: It just feels like basic things cost too much,” Kolvet wrote in the viral X post, which has racked up more than 3 million views.

The online controversy highlights a deep frustration for young adults in Los Angeles. While politicians appear to be debating inflation for their own ends, students are struggling with the reality of not being able to afford food.

A $20 burrito sounds “unjustifiable” to Klarissa Palacios, who graduated from USC in May with bachelor’s and master’s degrees in law, history and culture. While in school, Palacios interned at various city hall offices and said her hourly salary eventually reached $25 — a key consideration for college students, she said, because many young people determine a meal’s affordability based on how many work hours can pay it off.

With minimum wage in L.A. at $18.42 per hour as of July, college students earning this rate would need to work for more than an hour in order to pay for just one burrito, Palacios pointed out.

“I’m Mexican, so I grew up with free burritos at home, anytime I wanted. $20 is pretty steep,” she said. “I’m expected to eat three times a day. If I’m spending $20 per meal and I work eight hours, then that means I’m only really getting paid five hours.”

Noticing a need for affordable meals, Palacios and fellow USC student Josiah Herfurth spent this past semester hosting $10-per-person lunches at their college apartments, dubbing the offering Cafe 10:31. The idea budded from a survey they sent to fellow members of their campus ministry, which found that the leading reason students weren’t attending post-church lunches at restaurants ranging from In-N-Out to sit-down ramen spots was because they wanted to save money, not for a lack of transportation or time.

So Palacios and Herfurth began paying out of pocket for bulk Costco runs that fed as many as 40 people per event. On the menu? Tacos, chili, hot dogs and conversation.

“It started with being just a USC college student thing, and ended up being just a general young adults thing,” Herfurth said, referring to how word quickly spread to UCLA and Cal State Long Beach students, as well as the young adult community at their church.

Herfurth is used to meal prepping in bulk, and said it’s a common practice among college students hoping to cut costs. He and his roommates would use up to six stove burners at a time to prepare meals together, he said.

“It was always more fun for me when I could share something with someone else, and it also made things cheaper,” Herfurth said. “That was the key to me.”

As the online conversation around food affordability evolved, Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas) chimed in on X.

“Just hearing about this dumb $20 burrito debate so just thought I’d make the losers on social media angry before going to bed,” Crenshaw wrote. “Stop whining, get a job, eat ramen like the rest of us did in college, on a budget with four roommates.”

But Megan Monroe, who graduated from UCLA in June, said it’s unrealistic to eat packaged ramen like the iconic Cup Noodles brand for every meal.

“Just because someone else did it, doesn’t mean that was the right thing to do,” Monroe said. “Nutrition has come such a long way. … I think it’s for the best that we’re steering toward a better, nutritional diet.”

Still, Monroe is a stickler for keeping her diet affordable.

Even though UCLA’s dining halls are recognized as the best in the country, Monroe opted out of the campus meal plan her junior year. Her required freshman and sophomore year plans came out to about $9 per visit, but when she moved to an off-campus, university-owned housing complex, she had the choice to opt into a plan that would cost about $15 per visit. She deemed it too expensive.

“I was like, I can cook for less than that,” Monroe said.

Since her dining hall days, Monroe now makes one Trader Joe’s trip per week, which usually comes out to about $45. She typically has milk and cereal for breakfast and is known among friends to eat a homemade take on a classic deli combination “360 days of the year”: a cold sandwich, a piece of fruit and a bag of chips.

Monroe does dine out once per week, including for burritos — she favors the $11 burrito at Brother’s Cousins Tacos in Sawtelle.

In a burrito city like L.A., prices can range dramatically, such as Burritos La Palma’s $5 homestyle burritos, where the menu recommends ordering two or three per person for a satisfying meal. When former taco stand El Ruso opened its flagship in Studio City last month, burritos wrapped in 18-inch Sonoran flour tortillas and stuffed with rib-eye or chile Colorado were priced at $20 each. It’s not uncommon to find breakfast burritos that exceed $20, like the $24 wrap with beef machaca and shrimp offered on Daisy Margarita Bar’s weekend brunch menu.

For students at other universities, campus dining varies in affordability.

When Joshua Min started at Cal State Long Beach in 2025, a $315-million renovation project had just shut down its University Student Union through 2028.

In light of the closure shuttering certain food options on campus, the university gathered an array of local food trucks — with most meals within the $15 to $20 range, Min said. Not wanting to spend additional funds, he opted into a meal plan offered for commuter students like himself, with 50 meals for the 16-week semester that came to about $10 per meal.

Min said he had minimal complaints of the food itself; he often filled up his plate with chicken, rice, fruit and vegetables. But he found himself rationing the meal swipes, starting the semester conservatively and ending with extras, which he used by inviting his friends to come with him.

After that semester, Min opted to pack turkey or tuna salad sandwiches for school, using bulk ingredients that his family buys from Costco.

Min said he ultimately was disappointed at Cal State Long Beach’s selection of food trucks, as a student who prioritizes cutting his cost of living.

“It seemed like they just cobbled up these ideas at the last minute,” he said. “I respect the effort, but I think a lot of students were left unheard and hungry.”

WASHINGTON — The YOLO caucus is in session.

In a Republican-led Congress defined by deference to President Trump, there’s a small but steadily growing cohort who have found themselves more willing to break with the White House. Although the president maintains a firm grip on Republican voters, the expanding club could hinder his agenda on everything from the Iran war to immigration funding at a moment when his party holds a tenuous majority on Capitol Hill.

Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana is the newest member of the club. Just days after losing his primary to a Trump-backed challenger, Cassidy on Tuesday reversed himself on legislation involving the war in Iran and voted with Democrats to rein in U.S. military action.

“The way our Constitution is set up, Congress should hold the executive branch accountable,” he told reporters the day before.

Sen. John Cornyn of Texas could be next after Trump endorsed Ken Paxton, Cornyn’s rival for the Republican nomination in next week’s runoff.

Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky is perhaps a founding member of the YOLO caucus — slang for “you only live once,” used to punctuate unbothered or even foolhardy behavior. He frustrated Trump since the president’s first term, and his status was solidified after losing his primary on Tuesday to a Trump-backed challenger. Massie has enraged Trump by voting against his signature tax and spending bill and by pushing for the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files.

He hinted there’s more to come before he leaves office.

“I got seven months left in Congress,” Massie said with a grin during his concession speech as the crowd erupted.

More Republicans feel free to shrug off Trump

Other similarly situated Republicans include Sen. Thom Tillis, who was a fierce critic of former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and has more recently turned his attention to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. There’s also Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who joined Democrats last week in a bid to curb Trump’s war powers in Iran. Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky have voted against some of Trump’s Cabinet picks. And in the House, Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska has pushed to reclaim congressional power over tariffs.

“If the legislative branch always votes with the president, we do have a king,” Massie said in his concession speech Tuesday.

This hardly amounts to a revival of the Never Trump movement that some Republicans unsuccessfully hoped would curb the president’s excesses during his first term or block him from returning to office. Many in the party, including Trump’s occasional detractors, have either stood by or been unable to block the president as he launched the war in Iran and presided over an aggressive immigration enforcement operation and the dismantling of the federal workforce.

Today’s unencumbered Republicans don’t fit into an ideological box. But they are united by a sense of emboldening that can only be attained in a few ways in Trump’s Washington.

Many, like Tillis, McConnell and Bacon, have decided to retire and can cast votes knowing they’ll never again have to face Republican primary voters. Others like Collins and Murkowski have more leeway because they represent states that tend to reward political independence. And some like Massie banked on the idea that voters could support both Trump and someone who occasionally crossed him.

It’s a paradox for Trump. As he demands total loyalty and pushes out Republican dissenters, he’s left with a growing cohort who, for one reason or another, owe Trump nothing.

Democrats look to capitalize

That could be a problem for Senate Majority Leader John Thune and House Speaker Mike Johnson, who are already governing with threadbare majorities. Shifting loyalties of even a few Republican lawmakers could dramatically complicate the ability for either chamber to pass substantial legislation ahead of the November midterm elections.

Thune called Cornyn a “principled conservative” and “very effective senator” on Tuesday.

“None of us control what the president does,” he said.

The next tests could come later this week as Thune pushes a funding package for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection designed to pass on a party line basis.

Democrats are eager to pounce.

Speaking at an event in Washington on Tuesday sponsored by the Center for American Progress, House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries said he would aim to drive a wedge between Republicans by using a so-called discharge petition to bring issues directly to the floor for a vote.

That tactic has been successful in securing House passage on issues including the Epstein files and temporary protection of Haitian immigrants.

“When we’re disciplined and when we’re focused and when we put pressure in particular on the so-called swing seat Republicans, they have been breaking with us,” Jeffries said.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom told reporters on Tuesday that Trump’s endorsement of Cornyn’s rival was a sign that his political power lies within the Republican base — not the American public at large.

“He’s showed the only influence he has, and that’s an outsize influence within the base of the party,” the potential 2028 Democratic presidential contender said. “Otherwise he’s shown little to no influence with the American people.”

Counting the votes

That leaves Republicans gaming out how they might cobble together the votes needed to pass legislation.

Sen. John Hoeven of North Dakota called Cassidy a “good friend” and said the loss was “tough for him.” He said Cassidy “will always vote in line with what he thinks is best” but doubted he will become a less reliable Republican vote.

His fellow Louisianan, Sen. John Kennedy, said Cassidy deploys power “rationally and maturely” and “will continue to do the same thing.”

Cassidy repeatedly rejected the notion that he will spend his final months in Washington as a troublemaker for Trump, saying he’s going to do “what’s good for my country and my state.”

Yet the independent streak that ended his political career quickly resurfaced. A week after Trump visited China, Cassidy spoke of a Western alliance that’s “totally falling apart” and will be unable to “push back on the threat China represents.” He seemed stunned that the administration would create a nearly $1.8-billion fund to compensate Trump allies who they believe have been unjustly investigated and prosecuted.

“I just came off the campaign trail,” he said. “People are concerned about making their own ends meet, not about putting a slush fund together without a legal precedent.”

Sloan and Cappelletti write for the Associated Press. AP writer Stephen Groves in Washington contributed to this report.