Rephrasing the old adage:
Never attribute to incompetence that which can be understood as nefarious intent.
Republicans can’t govern. Just ask them.
As the party flails in its search for a speaker, the GOP is increasingly acknowledging publicly that its discord is embarrassing — and even dangerous.
It’s not clear yet that House Republicans’ inability to elect a new speaker has significantly recast the political paradigm in this country. But the danger for the party is in a drawn-out process continuing to cast doubt on the GOP’s ability to actually govern when voters give it power. A poll released this weekend showed two-thirds of Americans agreed that “Congress needs to elect a speaker as soon as possible” to deal with issues such as Israel, Ukraine and the looming government shutdown.
The situation has apparently gotten so dire that Republicans are effectively admitting that they can’t govern — that their party is so badly broken that it can’t do the most basic work voters elected it to do. And in some cases, they’re indicating their own party is actually doing damage.
The word of the day Sunday was apparently “embarrass.”
“Well, it’s embarrassing,” ousted former House speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” when asked about how this undercuts perceptions of the GOP’s ability to govern.
He later returned to the word: “This is embarrassing for the Republican Party, it’s embarrassing for the nation, and we need to look at one another and solve the problem.”
House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul (R-Tex.) did McCarthy one better, saying what Republicans were doing was not just embarrassing but also “so dangerous.”
“The world’s on fire. This is so dangerous, what we’re doing,” McCaul said on ABC’s “This Week.” “And most importantly, it’s embarrassing because it empowers and emboldens our adversaries like [Chinese President] Chairman Xi [Jinping] who says, you know, democracy doesn’t work.”
McCaul’s comments built upon what he said early in the speaker fracas, when he placed the threat of the GOP discord alongside external threats.
“Our adversaries are watching what we do — and quite frankly, they like it,” McCaul told the New York Times, adding: “One of the biggest threats I see is in that room, because we can’t unify as a conference and put the speaker in the chair together.”
In that same story, Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) said, “We’re not a governing body.” Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-N.Y.) said, “This is a bad episode of ‘Veep,’ and it’s turning into ‘House of Cards.’”
“It is an embarrassment,” added Rep. Carlos A. Gimenez (R-Fla.) last week.
When CNN host Jake Tapper on Friday likened the GOP infighting to high school, Rep. Steve Womack (R-Ark.) said that gave his party too much credit.
“That’s kind of offensive to high school people, because it’s really junior high stuff,” Womack said, adding: “I mean, look, we get wrapped around the axle on a lot of nonsensical things. But, yes, the world is burning around us. We’re fiddling. We don’t have a strategy.”
Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), a prominent foreign policy hawk like McCaul, agreed that the lack of a speaker “could” make the United States vulnerable on the world stage.
While many of these members come from the more institutionalist wing of the party, perhaps the most undersold and colorful review came from someone on the other side. It was from Rep. Eli Crane (R-Ariz.), who was one of eight Republicans who voted to oust McCarthy.
“I don’t think a lot of people here in this conference actually give a s--- what the American people want,” Crane told The Washington Post on Thursday, as his party was rejecting Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) for speaker.
Republicans don’t care about what Americans want them to do. They’re embarrassing. They’re acting dangerously. They’re falling down on the job at a critical time. They’re even helping nefarious foreign strongmen. Back during the drawn-out process to elect McCarthy in January, it was Democrats like President Biden saying these kinds of things; now it’s Republicans themselves.
It’s a reflection of just how dire the situation is. The strategy here is clearly to say these kinds of things to inject some urgency into the process — to get the 217 out of 221 House Republicans necessary to elect a speaker to come together and bring this sorry exercise to a conclusion. But before the party can get to that point, it apparently needs to have a bunch of prominent members going on the record to talk about how feckless it is and how perilous what it’s doing is.
And all the while, they strengthen the case Democrats will make during the 2024 election about how Republicans are the governing gang that can’t shoot straight.
All I really want is for the Press Poodles to ask
- "Is it possible that Republicans are making government dysfunctional on purpose?"
- "If there's any possibility of intentional dysfunction, what might be the goal(s) driving that effort?"
What’s next in the Republican fight for a new House speaker
It’s been nearly three weeks since eight Republicans lawmakers ousted Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) as House speaker, and since then the GOP conference has not been able to find a new leader.
Over the last two weeks, the two top candidates to replace McCarthy — Reps. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Steve Scalise (R-La.) — failed to gather enough support among their GOP colleagues to successfully win the speakership in House floor votes. Scalise, the first of the two to be nominated speaker, did not bring his nomination to the floor, aware that he would not be able to get majority support in the full chamber. Jordan brought his candidacy to the floor three times. Each time, he lost more support from fellow Republicans.
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The GOP tries once again to pick a House speaker, this time from the middle
The search for a speaker continues this week as Republicans try to choose among nine candidates, with the goal of getting a speaker-designate to the floor once again. Democrats, meanwhile, are widely expected to continue nominating and voting for House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) as speaker.
All this is happening as Congress inches closer to a key deadline: The government will run out of funds in mid-November and shut down if the House and Senate do not pass a number of appropriations bills. Republicans have virtually frozen activity on the House floor for almost three weeks over their inability to choose a new leader.
How many Republicans are running?
Nine House Republicans are running
- Tom Emmer (Minn.)
- Kevin Hern (Okla.)
- Pete Sessions (Tex.)
- Austin Scott (Ga.)
- Byron Donalds (Fla.)
- Jack Bergman (Mich.)
- Mike Johnson (La.)
- Dan Meuser (Pa.)
- Gary Palmer (Ala.).
What’s the next step?
The nine candidates are expected to make their pitches to the GOP conference on Monday during a closed-door meeting at 6:30 p.m. Eastern. During this candidate forum — run by the office of Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), the House Republican Conference chairwoman — lawmakers are also expected to continue to air their grievances over the process and plot out where their party should go next.
The House has never been speakerless for so long mid-session
When will Republicans pick a new nominee?
A conference-wide, closed-door vote on the next speaker-designate will probably happen Tuesday morning at around 9 a.m.
To win the vote in conference, a candidate must receive 50 percent of the vote, plus one. With nine Republicans running, it could take awhile to coalesce around a single candidate.
If no candidate gets a majority on the first ballot, the lawmaker with the fewest votes will be dropped and the process repeats itself until someone prevails.
How soon could there be a floor vote?
To win the speakership, a candidate has to win a simple majority of the members in the full House. If every member of the current Congress is present the day of the floor vote, that means the candidate must receive 217 votes.
The earliest the House could vote on a speaker is Tuesday at 11 a.m., when the chamber is next scheduled to meet.
But don’t expect it to be that early, given that Republicans will likely need several rounds in their conference to find their candidate.
The speaker-designate then must coordinate with House Speaker Pro Tempore Patrick T. McHenry (R-N.C.) on when to bring their nomination to the floor.
What might be different this time?
Already, some Republicans are circulating a pledge to support the party’s next nominee.
Rep. Mike Flood (R-Neb.), who last week told reporters he was tired of the lengthy speaker fight, is asking his colleagues to sign a unity pledge in which they promise to vote for the speaker-designate in the next floor vote.
“House Republicans need to elect a Speaker as soon as possible in order to return to work on behalf of the American people,” reads the pledge. “It is time to put politics and personalities aside and unite behind the next Republican Conference choice for Speaker.”
According to a Flood spokeswoman, a “growing number” of House Republicans — including speaker candidates Bergman, Hern, Johnson, Meuser, Scott, and Sessions — have already signed the pledge.
It’s not clear if any of the eight House Republicans who voted to remove McCarthy from the speakership will get behind the pledge. On Friday, seven of the eight signed a letter saying they’re willing to accept censure, suspension, or removal from the conference for their actions, as long as the party supported Jordan for speaker — an effort that failed.
Rep. Bob Good (R-Va.), one of the eight, on Monday shared a statement from the ultraconservative House Freedom Caucus demanding that leadership keep Republicans in Washington until this situation is settled and a new speaker is named.
“We must proceed with all possible speed and determination,” the statement reads.
Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.), another of the eight, told Fox Business on Monday morning that he wishes “we could have resolved it sooner.”
“We have a very deep bench. Every one of those nine members would be a step up and I believe would be a great leader,” he said.
