( Spanish) — The midterm elections in the United States are crucial for the direction the country will take, possibly redefining the power of the Republican and Democratic parties in Congress.
A third of the Senate and the entire House of Representatives will be renewed on November 8. Or to put it in concrete numbers: there are 35 of the 100 seats in the Senate at stake and the 435 seats in the House of Representatives in dispute.
In the House of Representatives, Republicans need to win five more seats than they currently have to gain control. If this happens, the Democratic Party would lose the majority it achieved in 2018, which it has maintained ever since, and which has allowed it since passing an impeachment or impeachment Donald Trump to create a select commission that investigates the assault on the Capitol by supporters of the former president.
But what is it, what does it do, and how is the US House of Representatives made up?
What is the US House of Representatives and what does it do?
The House of Representatives is the lower house of the United States Congress and, together with the Senate (upper house), makes up the legislative branch of the US government.
In accordance with the Constitution, the House of Representatives prepares and approves federal laws, that is, it presents bills or reforms existing ones.
The lower house has several exclusive powers, including the authority to introduce revenue bills, initiate impeachment proceedings against federal officials, and elect the country’s president if there is an equal number of votes in the Electoral College. .
This is how the US House of Representatives is made up.
The United States House of Representatives is made up of 435 members who are elected from among the 50 states of the country proportionally according to their populations. California, Texas, Florida and New York have the largest number of representatives.
Additionally, there are 5 non-voting delegates —although they do have the same powers as the other members— who represent the District of Columbia (the city of Washington), the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and four other United States territories: American Samoa, Guam, the US Virgin Islands, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands.
Members of the House of Representatives are elected by the citizenry by vote every two years and must be 25 years of age or older, be US citizens for at least 7 years, and be residents of the state (but not necessarily the district) they represent, as stipulated in the Constitution.
The highest-ranking official in the House of Representatives is its Speaker, who is elected by the representatives. This person is the third in the line of succession to the presidency of the United States. Since 2019, Democrat Nancy Pelosi has held the position of Speaker of the House.
Once a representative presents a bill, it must be reviewed by the committees and subcommittees (where it can be accepted, modified or completely rejected) before being presented to the full House for debate.
The House of Representatives has 23 commissions, each in charge of a specific political area, and 104 subcommittees, in charge of more specialized political areas. For example, the House Ways and Means Committee includes, among others, the Social Security and Commerce subcommittees.
