Kevin McCarthy: Pelosi is endangering Constitution to ensure she has more power

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Kevin McCarthy: Proxy voting empowers Pelosi, 'endangers constitution'

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy explains why House GOP is suing Nancy Pelosi in a bid to stop proxy voting amid coronavirus lockdowns

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Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is endangering the Constitution to ensure that she has more power by maintaining a system of proxy voting in Congress, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., accused Wednesday.

Appearing on "Fox & Friends" with host Steve Doocy, McCarthy said that the country expects Congress to convene in person and for 231 years they have done just that.

"From the Yellow Fever…in the 1700s, to the Civil War, to the burning of the [Capitol] building during in the 1900s, then you had Spanish flu, you had the 9/11 -- we still convened," he noted.

On Tuesday, House Republicans -- with McCarthy leading the charge -- filed a lawsuit against Pelosi's proxy voting, which was put in place during the coronavirus pandemic,

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"The only reason the Democrats are doing this [is] it empowers Pelosi to even be stronger," he asserted. "Watch what she was able to do just a couple [of] weeks ago: pass $3 trillion with never going through a committee –and] no one seeing the bill. She wrote it herself and brought it to the floor. The largest bill ever in the history of the United States."

Pelosi, however, had a different opinion.

“House Republicans’ sad stunt, shows that their only focus is to delay and obstruct urgently-needed action to meet the needs of American workers and families during the coronavirus crisis,” she admonished Tuesday.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of Calif., talks to reporters on Capitol Hill, Tuesday, May 5, 2020, in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

Proxy voting would allow House members to vote on another person's behalf if they are not able to be physically present at the Capitol, an unprecedented exception for an unparalleled health crisis.

At least 59 Democrats have submitted letters to the House Clerk's office to authorize their vote to be cast by proxy. Meanwhile, GOP lawmakers have said they will be in the Capitol to cast their votes.

Not a single Republican supported the measure as it passed earlier this month, arguing that the Constitution requires a quorum -- or a majority of lawmakers -- to be physically present in order to vote on measures, thus concluding that the proxy system is unconstitutional. Republicans also are concerned that the system concentrates too much power in the hands of only a few members.

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Speaker Pelosi argued that past rulings by the Supreme Court have upheld that the Constitution allows each chamber of Congress to set its own procedural rules. For proxy voting, the House sergeant-at-arms and the attending physician have to notify lawmakers 24 hours in advance of invoking remote voting and the rule will stand for up to 45 days once it has been invoked.

"Congress can make any rule but they cannot go against the Constitution," McCarthy urged.

"We are going to space today. We are opening up California. But, 63 Democrats are not coming to work and they're still being paid. They were able to come to work a couple [of] weeks ago but now they can't," he told Doocy.

"Why?" he asked. "Because it empowers Nancy Pelosi to have all the power. Only 20 members can hold all the proxies to be able to pass any bill they want on the floor."

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"[It's] unheard of and it is not what the Founders believed that the country should do," McCarthy remarked.

The new voting system will likely take place as early as this week, and Republicans have admitted they doubt the lawsuit will do anything to stop the votes from proceeding.

Fox News' Vandana Rambaran and Mike Emanuel contributed to this report.