Incoming Majority Whip Steve Scalise defended the lack of diversity for nearly all the new chairmanships of House committees, maintaining the GOP leadership team included "a lot of women."
The Republican Steering Committee announced its recommendations for House committee chairs on Tuesday, naming a team that was nearly all white men. The panel suggested one woman, Michigan Rep. Candice Miller, to chair the House Administration Committee.
"As part of leadership, we have a lot of women in our leadership team, I was just with (Washington Rep.) Catherine McMorris-Rodgers, our conference chairman, last night. Obviously, we have a number of other women that are very talented as part of our conference leadership," the Louisiana Republican told MSNBC's "Morning Joe" on Wednesday.
The newly-elected members of Congress represented a "diverse group," Scalise said, who would give the House a "strong boost" as lawmakers tried to work with President Barack Obama to "get things done."
Scalise predicted there would not be a government shutdown if Obama used an executive order on immigration, but said Congress would instead focus on keeping "government funded at the proper levels, which means under the spending caps that we have right now." He said Obama was creating a "divisive atmosphere" in Washington and the country over the immigration issue.
"The American people said they want Washington to work. They want the president to work with Congress. And, the president really is going to be setting this tone," he said. "It's time for the president to put all of the partisanship and divisiveness on the side, and roll up his sleeves."
Should Obama move forward on immigration through executive order, Scalise said lawmakers had "a lot of creative ideas," and that Congress was "looking at all kinds of options," but hadn't settled on any one strategy.
Scalise said Obama should instead be concentrating on getting the economy moving again, because that was "the American people's focus."
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