In The Godfather, there are fictional representations of the five Mafia families. The fictional families: Corleone, Tattaglia, Barzini, Cuneo, and Stracci; are supposed to generally represent five Mafia families: Bonnano, Colombo, Gambino, Genovese, and Lucchese; who were five competing gangs in 1931 that agreed to carve up New York City into territories.
In the 118th Congress, specifically in the House of Representatives, there actively appears five new families on Capitol Hill that seem to be defining each piece of legislation and have the capability of stymying any partisan or bipartisan effort to make laws and fund the government. They claim responsibility for ousting Speaker Kevin McCarthy and now threaten each piece of legislation due to the slim majority the Republicans have in the House.
The Five Families of Capitol Hill are:
The Freedom Caucus. The caucus is made up of hard right politically conservative lawmakers who formed the Tea Party movement and strongly back President Trump. It has 34 members and was founded in 2015 in opposition to Republican leadership. Membership is by invitation only.
https://perry.house.gov/uploadedfiles/hfc_rules_reforms_proposal_7.25.2022.pdf
The Republican Study Committee, which is an older conservative group and the largest GOP ideological faction and the largest House conservative caucus. It has 173 members. It was established in 1973. It is mainly policy oriented.
https://rsc-hern.house.gov/about
The Main Street Caucus that is made up of pro-business Republicans. It is more conservative than the Republican Governance Group. It has 71 members.
https://mainstreetcaucus.house.gov/
Republican Governance Group and its 42 members consist of mainly fiscally conservative but socially moderate members. It descended from the Tuesday Group which descended from the Wednesday Group.
https://republicangovernance.com/
Problem Solvers Caucus that includes both Republicans and Democrats and focuses on policies with bipartisan support. It has 60 members. It began in 2017.
https://problemsolverscaucus.house.gov/
There is cross pollination between the families, with lawmakers holding “membership” in more than one family at a time.
To reiterate, because of the very slim majority of the Republican party in the House of Representatives, it only takes a handful number of Republican votes to stop legislation from moving through the legislative process. These strong committees can and have influenced the process and made demands that have slowed if not stopped effective lawmaking. Your association is non-partisan and does not approve or disapprove the work of these groups. We want you to be aware of the dynamics of lawmaking in the 118th Congress and how it might affect legislation leading up to elections in 2024.
— EANGUS National Office
