Peninsula Daily News and The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The House has re-elected embattled Republican John Boehner speaker.
The Ohio lawmaker won a second, two-year term as leader with 220 votes, losing just a handful of votes in the Republican-controlled chamber.
The election of the speaker came as the House and Senate ushered in a new Congress today.
The 113th Congress convened at noon Washington, D.C., time (9 a.m. PST), the constitutionally mandated time, with pomp, pageantry — and of course, politics — on both sides of the Capitol.
In the Senate, Vice President Joe Biden swore in 12 new members elected in November, lawmakers who won another term and South Carolina Republican Tim Scott. The former House member was tapped by Gov. Nikki Haley to fill the remaining term of Sen. Jim DeMint, who resigned to head a Washington think tank.
Applause from members and the gallery marked every oath-taking. Looking on was former Vice President Walter Mondale.
In the House, Boehner swore in the lawmakers in the afternoon, including freshman Rep. Derek Kilmer, D-Gig Harbor, the 39-year-old Port Angeles native who succeeds Norm Dicks as 6th Congressional District representative. Dicks did not seek re-election after holding a congressional seat since 1977.
Addressing the 80-plus new members, Boehner told them that if they came “to see your name in lights or to pass off political victory as accomplishment, you have come to the wrong place. The door is behind you.”
“If you have come here humbled by the opportunity to serve; if you have come here to be the determined voice of the people; if you have come here to carry the standard of leadership demanded not just by our constituents but by the times, then you have come to the right place,” he said.
