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who were the 20 people in the house who worked to get the provision of having women join the draft removed?

There were not literally “20 people in the House” with a single, uniquely named list, but there was a specifically cited group of 22 Republican House members who signed a letter in 2024 demanding that any provision requiring women to register for the draft be removed from the NDAA. That group is the one most often referenced when people say “the 20 people in the House” in this context.

Who the group was

On September 19, 2024, Representatives Chip Roy (TX‑21) and Mary Miller (IL‑15) led a coalition of 22 Republican lawmakers in calling on House Speaker Mike Johnson to oppose any “female draft” provision in the Fiscal Year 2025 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). They wrote that forcing women to register for the Selective Service was “an affront to our nation’s values” and argued it did not enhance military readiness.

The letter was framed as a continuation of earlier efforts to defeat similar provisions, which had already been removed from prior defense bills.

The 22 House members who signed

The lawmakers who signed the Roy–Miller letter (the group often summarized as “about 20 House members”) were:

  1. Chip Roy (TX‑21) – lead signatory
  2. Mary Miller (IL‑15) – lead signatory
  3. Bob Good (VA‑05)
  4. Josh Brecheen (OK‑02)
  5. Tom Tiffany (WI‑07)
  6. Harriet M. Hageman (WY)
  7. Paul Gosar (AZ‑09)
  8. Bill Posey (FL‑08)
  9. Andy Biggs (AZ‑05)
  10. Ralph Norman (SC‑05)
  11. Brian Babin (TX‑36)
  12. Eric Burlison (MO‑07)
  13. Barry Moore (AL‑02)
  14. Warren Davidson (OH‑08)
  15. Michael Cloud (TX‑27)
  16. Alex Mooney (WV‑02)
  17. Andy Ogles (TN‑05)
  18. Diana Harshbarger (TN‑01)
  19. Mark Green (TN‑07)
  20. Andrew Clyde (GA‑09)
  21. Lauren Boebert (CO‑03)
  22. Robert Aderholt (AL‑04)
  23. Keith Self (TX‑03)

(Note: The original letter lists 22 signatories; sometimes people round this to “about 20” in headlines or forum posts.)

Earlier House action on the same issue

There was also a separate, older House vote in July 2016 , when the full House passed an amendment by Rep. Warren Davidson (then Ohio) that would bar the Selective Service System from using funds to require women to register for the draft. That vote was 217–203, and it was supported by a coalition of conservatives and some libertarian-leaning Republicans, but no single “20-person” list was highlighted in news coverage for that vote.

Over the years, multiple lawmakers (including Davidson, Hawley in the Senate, and later Roy, Miller, and their allies) have worked to keep women out of mandatory draft registration, but the specific “~20 House members” story most people refer to is the 22-member 2024 letter led by Roy and Miller.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.