How the Justin Amash NSA amendment got a vote

If there is one episode that defines House Speaker John Boehner’s (R-OH) leadership style, it’s how Rep Justin Amash (R-MI), the most defiant Republican in the House, won the right to offer a controversial amendment to curb the National Security Agency’s ability to collect phone data from Americans.

The amendment — opposed by Speaker Boehner, several key committee chairman and the White House — marked the first test of lawmakers’ support for sweeping NSA data collection programs exposed by Edward Snowden. Rep Amash voted against Rep Boehner for Speaker. He votes against the leadership team nearly every day on the House floor. On July 29, the Speaker’s office told Rep Amash to approach Speaker Boehner in the House chamber to chart a course to offer the amendment to limit the phone data program. After that phone call, before he spoke to Boehner, Rep Amash still took to Twitter to threaten leadership that he would bring the entire bill down. Speaker Boehner opposes the NSA amendment. Leadership doesn’t care much for Rep Amash. But they were listening to complaints from a broad swath of Republicans who wanted to vote against the spying program that Snowden revealed.