The nomination of Rep. Steve Scalise as Speaker of the House was shorter than an afternoon nap.
No sooner had Republicans apparently, behind closed doors, possibly settled on Scalise over Jim Jordan than Scalise’s coalition fell apart leaving a wide-open question as of today. Now heading into a weekend, where will the House go next week regarding unifying around a Speaker?
Democrats will gladly keep nominating and voting for their guy, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, but that vote’s going nowhere.
It’s now on Republicans to somehow unify and decide on a leader. As ABC News reports, that unity may yet be quite a ways off:
House Republicans are casting ballots for the next speaker in a candidate forum Friday afternoon — now with two candidates: Rep. Jim Jordan and Rep. Austin Scott. It’s the latest in a speakership battle riddled with chaos and uncertainty that is leaving many GOP members pessimistic.
The candidates are working to get enough votes to secure the top spot after Rep. Steve Scalise backed out of the race Thursday night. On Friday afternoon, Scott, R-Ga., a member of the Armed Services Committee who has been close to GOP leaders, filed to run for speaker against Jordan.
“We are in Washington to legislate, and I want to lead a House that functions in the best interest of the American people,” Scott posted to X, formerly known as Twitter, Friday.
Some GOP House members are less than enthused and see this as a losing proposition with no end in sight:
“There’s not a person in America — and that includes the Republican conference — that is going to get 217 votes,” Rep. Steve Womack, R-Ark., told ABC News Senior Congressional Correspondent Rachel Scott Friday.
He issued a blistering warning this could have consequences ahead of the 2024 election.
Lots of members like Rep. Jim Jordan personally but they don’t want to give Matt Gaetz a victory of any kind. Scalise would’ve been a more establishment pick, but the House Freedom Caucus doesn’t want to go along. Where is the consensus?
Kevin McCarthy, largely playing a non-influential referee on the sideline, blamed a small minority of the House GOP conference for the disruption:
There are serious questions about whether any Republican can unite the party.
McCarthy insisted the conferences is not fractured, telling ABC News Senior Congressional Correspondent Rachel Scott Thursday night that “It’s 4% of the conference … it’s 4% of the conference and all the Democrats that want this chaos.”
It’s still a jump ball and it may take many rounds of internal debates, forums, and votes before the GOP can emerge with a consensus pick that won’t get derailed on the House floor or stuck going a hundred rounds of embarrassing failed votes.
In short, when the GOP House is needed at the moment to debate things like funding Iran, Matt Gaetz, with no plan in mind, tossed a political grenade in the room and has no way to clean it up.
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