Hoynes Holds: Deadlocked Senate and the Unwilling Tie-Breaker
Plot Beats
The narrative micro-steps within this event
Margaret announces the Vice President's arrival, shifting Leo's focus from paperwork to impending political confrontation.
Hoynes enters with casual greeting, masking the tension about the impending vote decision.
Leo confirms the deadlocked Senate vote, forcing Hoynes to confront his constitutional duty.
Who Was There
Characters present in this moment
Guarded and combative on the surface; inwardly anxious about future political vulnerability and determined to avoid being used as a scapegoat.
Hoynes enters, greets Leo, listens to the plea, and responds defensively—restating his past opposition to the credit, enumerating policy failures, and refusing the political cost of casting the tie‑breaking vote.
- • Avoid casting a tie‑breaking vote that will be used against him by political opponents.
- • Maintain personal integrity and consistency by refusing to endorse policy he believes failed.
- • The ethanol tax credit has failed its policy goals and is indefensible on merits.
- • Republicans and political opponents will exploit his vote to damage his reputation and career.
Controlled urgency—professionally strained, masking concern about institutional failure and the political consequences of a turned‑down ask.
Leo summons the Vice President into his office, delivers the President's request plainly, cites concrete policy figures, tries to persuade politically, and accepts the exchange as an operational emergency.
- • Secure Hoynes's tie‑breaking vote to pass the ethanol tax credit.
- • Protect the President's political standing by resolving the 50-50 Senate impasse quickly.
- • The ethanol tax credit produces measurable economic benefits (jobs and investment).
- • The Vice President has a constitutional duty and political obligation to break the tie when asked.
Professional and unobtrusive—aware of gravity but remaining composed and procedural.
Margaret quietly enters and announces the Vice President's arrival, serving as the ritual door‑opener and stabilizing administrative presence before stepping back into the background.
- • Ensure the meeting proceeds smoothly without unnecessary interruption.
- • Support Leo's office by managing small logistics and preserving decorum.
- • Discretion and administrative order help senior staff focus during crises.
- • Her role is to enable senior decision‑makers, not to interject into substance.
Objects Involved
Significant items in this scene
The ethanol tax credit functions as the disputed object around which the argument orbits: Leo cites its claimed benefits (16,000 jobs, $4 billion investment) as justification; Hoynes rebuts with policy critique, making the credit both the substantive stake and the symbolic test of administrative authority.
Location Details
Places and their significance in this event
The White House more broadly serves as the institutional frame: its protocols, reputational risks, and chain-of-command pressures are the backdrop that transforms a policy vote into an existential administrative problem.
Leo's office is the intimate political theater where persuasion and personal cost collide: it contains the briefing papers, allows a private delivery of the President's regret, and forces a one-on-one confrontation that compresses institutional pressure into human terms.
Narrative Connections
How this event relates to others in the story
"Hoynes's passionate defense of his Senate record and integrity is later acknowledged by Bartlet, transforming a political defeat into a moment of respect."
Key Dialogue
"LEO: "The President needs you to go down there and fulfill one of your two constitutional responsibilities and vote for the ethanol tax credit. We need you to break the tie. He also wanted me to tell you that he regrets putting you in this position.""
"HOYNES: "You got to get me off the hook, Leo. You can't ask me to do this.""
"HOYNES: "The ethanol tax credit has accomplished exactly none of its goals. Production is close to nothing. It will never be large enough to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. And it requires substantial energy to produce, which totally washes out any overall conservation effect.""