WASHINGTON (CN) - A growing feud between House Republicans over a proposed rules change that would allow new parents in Congress to temporarily vote from afar ground the chamber to a screeching halt, as lawmakers failed to pass a procedural measure setting this week's voting schedule.

It was an embarrassing rout for House Speaker Mike Johnson as nine GOP lawmakers led by Florida Representative Anna Paulina Luna refused to back a rules package which included several pieces of legislation crucial to President Donald Trump's agenda.

The defections came amid a spat between Luna and House Republican leadership over her proposed rules change, known as a discharge petition, that would have permitted lawmakers who are new parents to vote by proxy for 12 weeks surrounding the birth of their children. Tuesday's rules package included a provision which would have effectively killed her measure, despite Luna gathering all of the necessary signatures on both sides of the aisle to support her proposal.

Luna and the coalition of other Republicans, which included New York Representative Mike Lawler and Tennessee Representative Tim Burchett, voted alongside Democrats to sink the procedural measure.

Speaking to reporters following the rule vote, Johnson said that the result was "very disappointing" and pointed out that it was rare to see Republicans side with Democrats on such a move.

The House speaker reiterated his contention that proxy voting was unconstitutional and that it would open "Pandora's Box." And he added that the rule's failure meant the House couldn't vote as scheduled on several Republican-led bills such as a controversial voter ID measure.

"That rule being brought down means that we can't have any further action on the floor this week," Johnson said. "All that was just wiped off the table. It's very unfortunate, but we'll regroup and come back and do this again."

Johnson on Tuesday afternoon announced that the House would not vote again for the rest of the week.

Luna, who until this week was a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, has been furious with her colleagues in recent days over suggestions that they would try to block her proxy voting measure. Those frustrations came to a head on Monday, when she resigned from the Republican voting bloc, telling them that her respect for the group had been "shattered."

The Florida lawmaker, who gave birth to her daughter just last year, accused a group of Freedom Caucus lawmakers of campaigning to "misrepresent" her and her measure as obstructing the Trump administration's agenda by tying it to the proposed voter ID bill and other legislation that had been scheduled for a vote this week.

"This tactic was not just a betrayal of trust; it was a descent into the very behavior we have long condemned - a practice that we, as a group, have repeatedly criticized leadership for allowing," Luna wrote.

Luna thanked Maryland Representative Andy Harris, chair of the Freedom Caucus, for his "gentlemanly" conduct but that she was resigning.

"I cannot remain part of a caucus where a select few operate outside its guidelines, misuse its name, broker backroom deals that undermine its core values and where the lines of compromise and transaction are blurred, disparage me to the press and encourage misrepresentation of me to the American people," she said.

Following Tuesday's rules vote, several Republican lawmakers who joined Luna in opposition explained their decision.

Ohio Representative Max Miller, who himself is a new dad, said that voting for the floor action would "pull the rug" out from under his colleague's proposed proxy voting petition though Luna had gotten the required signatures "fair and square."

"We are the pro-life, pro-family party," Miller said in a statement. "As a new dad, I just couldn't support it."

In a video message posted to X Tuesday afternoon, Burchett appeared to suggest that Luna's discharge petition had been successful in changing House rules thanks to the failure of the rules package. But lawmakers will still need to vote on the underlying resolution to ink that change.

Despite that, the Tennessee congressman rehashed his support for proxy voting. "Seems pretty reasonable to me," he said.

Luna offered her proposal alongside Colorado Representative Brittany Pettersen, a Democrat, who also recently had a child. In a statement Tuesday, Pettersen said she was "incredibly grateful" to her colleagues who voted to block the GOP attempt to sink the proposed rules change.

"Your support sends a clear message: making Congress more accessible to new parents brings us one step closer to a government that truly reflects the people that it serves," she said.

Meanwhile, Republicans' failure to pass this week's rules package not only scuttles their proposed voter ID bill but also stymies any chance of passing California Representative Darrell Issa's legislation aimed at cracking down on nationwide injunctions by federal courts. The House was expected to vote on Issa's bill as early as Wednesday.

Source: Courthouse News Service