House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) warned his skeptics in the House Republican Conference against opposing him for Speaker on the House floor.
“We have to speak as one voice. We will only be successful if we work together, or we’ll lose individually. This is very fragile — that we are the only stopgap for this Biden administration,” McCarthy said on Newsmax Monday.
“And if we don’t do this right, the Democrats can take the majority. If we play games on the floor, the Democrats can end up picking who the Speaker is,” McCarthy said.
McCarthy completed the first step toward Speakership when he won the House GOP’s nomination for the position earlier this month against a long-shot challenge from Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), a former chair of the hard-line House Freedom Caucus, in a 188 to 31 vote, with five others voting for neither of the two.
But in order to secure the Speakership, he needs to win majority support on the House floor on the first day of the new Congress on Jan. 3. And with Republicans winning a narrower-than-anticipated majority of around 222 seats to around 213 for Democrats, McCarthy can only afford to lose a handful of Republican votes on the floor.
All Democrats are expected to vote for their party’s Speaker nominee, expected to be finalized as Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) this week. At least five House Republicans from the hard-line conservative wing have publicly said or strongly indicated that they will not vote for McCarthy on the floor, throwing his Speakership bid into dangerous territory.
Those members are Reps. Bob Good (Va.), Ralph Norman (S.C.), Matt Rosendale (Mont.), Matt Gaetz (Fla.) and Biggs.
Several others have expressed skepticism of McCarthy but have not said how they will vote on Jan. 3. Biggs said on the "Conservative Review" podcast on Monday that he thinks the number of “hard noes” on McCarthy is around 20 GOP members, which would sink McCarthy’s bid.
McCarthy’s warning about Democrats picking the Speaker echoes repeated warnings from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), who has broken with her Freedom Caucus colleagues to strongly support McCarthy. A handful of moderates, she says, could join with Democrats to elect a more moderate Speaker.
McCarthy also alluded to other factions of the party and the possibility of moderates breaking away.
“You have to listen to everybody in the conference, because five people on any side can stop anything when you’re in the majority,” McCarthy said on Newsmax.
Those opposed to McCarthy cite various issues, such as his not committing to pass a budget that slashes spending, his resistance to Freedom Caucus rules change requests that would give more power to rank-and-file members and his unwillingness to commit to impeaching Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
McCarthy did last week call on Mayorkas to resign or face a House GOP investigation and potential impeachment inquiry.
Allies of McCarthy also point out that there is no viable GOP alternative to him for Speaker, though Biggs has said he expects a more consensus candidate to emerge before Jan. 3.
“I think at the end of the day, calmer heads will prevail. We’ll work together to find the best path forward,” McCarthy said.
Though a majority of the whole House is 218 members, it is possible for a Speaker to be elected with fewer than that number since a Speaker needs majority support from only those voting for a specific candidate by surname.
Absences, “present” votes and vacancies lower that threshold. Democratic Rep. Donald McEachin (Va.) died on Monday, and his seat is likely to be vacant on Jan. 3.
For House Republicans, much of the next five weeks will be overshadowed by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s (R-Calif.) quest for the Speakership amid opposition from a handful of hard-line right-wing members that threatens to sink his bid.
McCarthy has made moves to boost his conservative credentials in recent weeks as a minority criticizes his leadership. Internal House Republican Conference debates over rules and McCarthy’s management of lame-duck legislative issues could also sway his position with those skeptical of his leadership.
The GOP leader won his party’s nomination for Speaker earlier this month against a long-shot challenge from Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), a former chair of the hard-line House Freedom Caucus, in a 188 to 31 vote, with five others voting for neither of the two. But that is just the first step in McCarthy’s quest, and he needs to win majority support on the House floor on Jan. 3 to secure the Speakership.
At least five House GOP members — Reps. Bob Good (Va.), Ralph Norman (S.C.), Matt Rosendale (Mont.), Matt Gaetz (Fla.) and Biggs — explicitly say or strongly indicate they will not vote for McCarthy on the floor. And with Republicans winning a slimmer-than-expected majority of around 222 seats to around 213 Democrats, that puts McCarthy’s Speakership in the danger zone.
McCarthy needs 218 votes on the floor, assuming every House member casts a ballot for a Speaker candidate and there are no absences or “present” votes, though it is possible for a Speaker to be elected with fewer than 218 votes.
If no one wins a majority, the vote will go to another ballot, a scenario that last happened a century ago. The longest Speakership election in history occurred in the 1850s and took 133 ballots over two months.
Allies of the GOP leader maintain optimism that he will secure the Speakership.
“I’m of the opinion that on Jan. 3 we’ll come together as a conference and elect Kevin McCarthy to be Speaker of the House,” Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), who is likely to chair the House Oversight and Reform Committee next year, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday. “There are certainly five to eight members that have said they’re leaning towards voting no against Kevin McCarthy … but I’m hopeful at the end of the day that we will come together as a conference and elect Kevin.”
Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) on “Fox News Sunday” pointed out a key dynamic in McCarthy’s favor: There is no viable Republican alternative to McCarthy.
“He’s worked hard. He’s accomplished the goal, albeit a slim one, of winning back the House majority, and he deserves it. And I don’t believe there’s anyone else in our conference who could get to 218,” Fitzpatrick said.
But Biggs said on the “Conservative Review” podcast that he thinks the number of “hard noes” on McCarthy could be around 20 GOP members, which would sink his bid. Biggs has also predicted that an alternative consensus candidate will emerge before Jan. 3.
Conservative firebrand Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) has broken with her Freedom Caucus colleagues to become one of McCarthy’s most vocal supporters, warning that moderate Republicans could join Democrats and elect a compromise moderate Speaker. McCarthy skeptics have dismissed that prospect as a red herring.
This week, the House Republican Conference will consider another batch of rules change proposals that includes some requests from the Freedom Caucus. Those include a measure to ban earmarks, which were brought back in this Congress as “community project funding” after a decadelong ban.
Republicans will also elect new regional representatives this week under an expanded structure that gives more power to rank-and-file members. Those members will be part of the House Republican Steering Committee, the body of a few dozen members that controls committee and chairmanship assignments for the party.
McCarthy said earlier this month that the new map that increases the number of representatives from 13 to 19 pushes “power further down to more regions, more to the conference itself” and “dilutes the power greater to the members” — addressing a request from conservatives.
In another apparent gesture to critics, McCarthy during a trip to the U.S.-Mexico border before Thanksgiving called for Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to resign or potentially face impeachment.
“Let’s not be ambiguous. Mayorkas needs [to be] impeached. Period. No hesitation,” Biggs responded in a tweet.
McCarthy also recently reiterated a promise to remove three Democrats from committee assignments: Reps. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) from the House Intelligence Committee over Schiff’s handling of investigations of former President Trump’s ties with Russia and Swalwell’s relationship with an alleged Chinese spy, and Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) from the House Foreign Affairs Committee over what he says are past antisemitic comments.
Schiff hit back at McCarthy’s promise on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday.
“McCarthy’s problem is not with what I have said about Russia. McCarthy’s problem is he can’t get to 218 without Marjorie Taylor Greene and Paul Gosar and Matt Gaetz, and so he will do whatever they ask,” Schiff said.
McCarthy also said in a Facebook post last week that the House will start every day with a prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance with “no exceptions,” a custom that has been happening daily on the House floor for decades, as outlined by the House rules. He also said that the text of the Constitution will be read aloud on the House floor on the first day of the new congressional session, which McCarthy tweeted “hasn’t been done in years.”
Another immediate test of McCarthy will be his management of his conference during the lame-duck legislative session. Congress’s to-do list before the end of the year includes the annual National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), a Dec. 16 government funding deadline and a White House request for an additional $37.7 billion in Ukraine assistance.
Ukraine funding is a likely flashpoint for House Republicans, with many conservative members opposed to any new funding and others who say there should be funding for military support but are skeptical of economic and humanitarian aid.
And Biggs suggested on “Conservative Review” that Republicans should hold up the NDAA over provisions he described as “woke crap” and to push the military to reinstate service members who were discharged due to refusal to comply with COVID-19 vaccine mandates.
“Let’s hold the bill hostage. Let’s leverage what we have,” Biggs said. “Leverage only happens once in a while when you’re in the minority.”
McCarthy said after House GOP leadership elections this month that he thinks final passage of the NDAA should be delayed until after Republicans take control of the House. The House passed a version of the NDAA earlier this year, which McCarthy supported and the Freedom Caucus opposed, and the Senate is considering its version of the bill during the lame-duck session.
“I’ve watched what the Democrats have done in many of these, especially in the NDAA and the wokeism that they want to bring in there,” McCarthy said. “I actually believe the NDAA should hold up until the first of the year, and let’s get it right.”
A narrower-than-anticipated House Republican majority and a growing number of House Republicans expressing opposition to House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) are threatening to derail his bid to be Speaker of the House.
McCarthy won his party’s nomination for Speaker this month but needs to secure a majority of all those casting a vote for a specific candidate in a Jan. 3 House floor vote in order to officially be elected Speaker.
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Support from 218 House Republicans, marking a majority of the House, would shore up his position.
A Speaker can be elected with fewer than 218 votes if there are absences, vacancies or some members vote “present,” but McCarthy does not have much wiggle room. Democrats will have around 213 seats, and all are expected to vote for a Democratic Speaker nominee. Republicans will have around 222 seats.
McCarthy maintains confidence that he will win the Speakership, but around five House Republicans have already signaled they will not support McCarthy’s Speakership bid on the floor, likely already putting him under 218 and throwing his position into dangerous territory. Several others are withholding support, too, without necessarily saying they will vote against McCarthy on Jan. 3.
Opposition to McCarthy
Rep. Andy Biggs (Ariz.)
Biggs, a former chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, mounted a last-minute challenge to McCarthy for the House GOP’s Speakership nomination, when he got 31 votes to McCarthy’s 188, and five others voted for other candidates. After the nomination, Biggs said he will not vote for McCarthy to be Speaker.
“I do not believe he will ever get to 218 votes, and I refuse to assist him in his effort to get those votes,” Biggs tweeted.
He cited McCarthy’s not promising to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas as one reason for withholding support. On Tuesday, McCarthy called on Mayorkas to resign, saying House Republicans will investigate and consider opening an impeachment inquiry if he does not.
Rep. Matt Gaetz (Fla.)
“Kevin McCarthy will revert to his establishment mean the moment he gets power, and that’s why there are enough of us now, a critical mass, standing as a bulwark against his ascension to the Speakership,” Gaetz said on former Trump adviser Stephen Bannon’s “War Room” show on Tuesday.
Gaetz additionally told reporters on Nov. 15 that he would vote for someone other than McCarthy on the House floor on Jan. 3.
Rep. Bob Good (Va.)
“I will not be supporting him on Jan. 3,” Good said on "John Fredericks Radio Show" on Tuesday. He added that he thinks there are “more than enough” members who are “resolved not to support him” and deny McCarthy the Speakership.
The freshman Virginia congressman, who ousted former Rep. Denver Riggleman (R-Va.) in a 2020 primary, previously said on the same radio show that he had confronted McCarthy about his tactics during a House GOP conference meeting before the Speaker nomination vote. Good took issue with a McCarthy-aligned PAC spending millions to support certain Republicans in primaries over others, and noted that McCarthy had endorsed Riggleman in his 2020 primary.
“He admitted there at the mic, though, that he spent money in these races based on who would support him for Speaker,” Good said.
Good has also said that he believes there are a “dozen or so” House Republicans who will oppose McCarthy on the House floor.
Rep. Ralph Norman (S.C.)
Norman’s opposition to McCarthy centers around the budget. Norman said he asked McCarthy to adopt a model seven-year budget crafted by the Republican Study Committee, which included $16.6 trillion in cuts over 10 years.
“Just a solid 'no' led me to believe he's really not serious about it,” Norman said on Bannon’s “War Room” on Tuesday.
The slim House GOP majority, he added, provides an opportunity for hard-line conservative members to pressure McCarthy and push for their priorities.
Norman first revealed his opposition to McCarthy to Just the News, and clarified to Politico that he will vote for someone other than McCarthy to be Speaker – and will not vote “present.”
Rep. Matt Rosendale (Mont.)
Rosendale, a freshman, has signaled opposition to McCarthy for Speaker.
“He wants to maintain the status quo, which consolidates power into his hands and a small group of individuals he personally selects. We need a leader who can stand up to a Democrat-controlled Senate and President Biden, and unfortunately, that isn’t Kevin McCarthy,” Rosendale said in a tweet after McCarthy was nominated to be Speaker.
Additional McCarthy skeptics and unknowns
Several other conservative members have indicated that McCarthy has not yet earned their support, or declined to answer questions about McCarthy’s Speakership altogether.
Rep. Scott Perry (Pa.)
Perry, the current chair of the House Freedom Caucus, has repeatedly said that McCarthy does not have support from 218 members.
“It's becoming increasingly perilous as we move forward,” Perry said of McCarthy’s position in an interview last week.
Perry has been pushing McCarthy and House GOP leadership to implement rules changes that, on the whole, would give more power to rank-and-file members and lessen that of leaders. But he is not committing to vote against McCarthy at this time.
“I’m not making my position known,” Perry said in an interview last week. “I do have an open mind, but I also see what’s happening.”
Rep. Chip Roy (Texas)
Roy has similarly said that McCarthy does not have majority support for Speaker, but has not said how he intends to vote on the House floor on Jan. 3.
“Nobody has 218, and someone's going to have to earn 218,” Roy said last week.
In addition to also pushing for a more open process, Roy has expressed that he does not think House GOP leadership’s commitments to investigate the Biden administration are aggressive enough. He is also a supporter of withholding funding unless the Biden administration ends COVID-19 vaccine mandates for the military.
Rep. Dan Bishop (N.C.)
Bishop said that his vote for Speaker hinges on more than rules changes.
“What it is about more now is whether somebody can seize the initiative to come up with a creative approach to sort of recalibrate how this place works in hopes of moving off the status quo and making it effective for the American people,” Bishop said in a brief interview last week.
“At this moment, I'm open to anyone seizing the initiative in the way that I described,” Bishop said.
Rep. Andrew Clyde (Ga.)
“Well, I will tell you that you’ll know that on January the third,” Clyde said on "John Fredericks Radio Show" on Monday when asked whether he would vote for McCarthy. “We’re still having negotiations.”
Rep. Barry Moore (Ala.)
Moore said in a brief interview last week that he is waiting to see how negotiations on rules changes go, but he was not necessarily a hard “no” on McCarthy.
“We won't really know until Jan. 3 how things shake out,” he said.
Hard-line members supporting McCarthy
Not all members of the House Freedom Caucus or the more confrontational wing are united in their antagonism of McCarthy. In fact, some are strong supporters.
Rep. Jim Jordan (Ohio)
Some conservatives have suggested Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), a founding Freedom Caucus member who challenged McCarthy for GOP leader in 2018, as an alternative Speaker candidate. But Jordan, who is likely to chair the House Judiciary Committee, has thrown his support behind McCarthy.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.)
The firebrand Georgia congresswoman was once a doubter of McCarthy’s ability to become Speaker, but has now become one of his most vocal supporters for the post. Greene, who has said McCarthy will have to “give me a lot of power” to make the GOP base happy, said she is working to convince her fellow conservative members to vote for McCarthy.
Greene has warned that moderate Republicans could join Democrats and elect a compromise moderate Speaker, but McCarthy skeptics have dismissed that prospect as a red herring.
Rep. Randy Weber (Texas)
Weber, a House Freedom Caucus member, said he is pro-McCarthy for Speaker.
“He's poured his heart and guts and soul out into building this conference,” Weber told The Hill last week. “I've been here 10 years. ... I've never seen the conference in better shape than it is now.”
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) called on Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to resign over his handling of the U.S.-Mexico border, saying that GOP lawmakers will consider impeachment next year if he does not step down.
“If Secretary Mayorkas does not resign, House Republicans will investigate, every order, every action and every failure will determine whether we can begin impeachment inquiry,” McCarthy said at a press conference in El Paso, Texas, on Tuesday.
McCarthy cited the Department of Homeland Security head's statements to Congress that the border is under control, record border crossing numbers and his ending of the "Remain in Mexico" asylum policy instituted during the Trump administration as reasons for resignation.
“Our country may never recover from Secretary Mayorkas’s dereliction of duty,” McCarthy said.
The comments from the minority leader are his strongest words on impeachment to date, but they fall short of a promise to bring up articles against Mayorkas.
McCarthy was nominated by House Republicans to serve as Speaker in the next Congress last week during a closed-door vote.
But he still faces opposition from hard-line conservatives, who called on him to be more aggressive on topics including the impeachment of Biden administration officials and President Biden himself.
Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), the former chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, mounted a last-minute protest challenge to McCarthy for Speaker, citing the minority leader's lack of commitment to impeach Mayorkas. Biggs has previously introduced articles of impeachment against the administration official. He won 31 votes in the secret-ballot House Republican Conference meeting, while McCarthy received 188.
McCarthy needs support from a majority of those voting for a Speaker candidate on the House floor on Jan. 3 in order to be elected to the post.
But Republicans won a narrow majority in the 2022 midterms, and McCarthy has little wiggle room for error on that vote. A few Republicans, including Biggs, have indicated that they will not vote for him.
The press conference with other House GOP members came after a day of touring the U.S.-Mexico border and meeting with border officials.
McCarthy said that Republican Reps. Jim Jordan (Ohio) and James Comer (Ky.), the likely chairs of the House Judiciary and Oversight Committees next year, “have my complete support to investigate the collapse of our border, and the shutdown of ICE enforcement.”
“Leader McCarthy is right. Americans deserve accountability for the unprecedented crisis on the southwest border. Republicans will hold Secretary Mayorkas accountable for his failure to enforce immigration law and secure the border through all means necessary,” Jordan, who would oversee impeachment proceedings if they occurred, said in a statement distributed during the press conference.
Republicans made a pledge to investigate the Biden administration’s border and migration policies a key part of their midterm campaign message, and Comer has long said he will hold hearings about the border. House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) joked in September that the House GOP would give Mayorkas a reserved parking spot because he would be testifying so often.
Mayorkas, who has no plans to resign, pushed back on Congress in a statement issued shortly after McCarthy's speech.
“Secretary Mayorkas is proud to advance the noble mission of this Department, support its extraordinary workforce, and serve the American people. The Department will continue our work to enforce our laws and secure our border, while building a safe, orderly, and humane immigration system,” the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement.
“Members of Congress can do better than point the finger at someone else; they should come to the table and work on solutions for our broken system and outdated laws, which have not been overhauled in over 40 years,” the statement continued.
In appearances before Congress last week, Mayorkas maintained that the border is under control, but he acknowledged that the fiscal year ending in September showed that a record 1.7 million migrants attempted to cross the Southwest border.
“The entire hemisphere is suffering a migration crisis. We are seeing unprecedented movement of people from country to country,” he said.
He also pledged to look for new ways to restrict immigration now that a federal court has struck down Title 42, which allowed the agency to quickly expel migrants without seeking asylum due to public health concerns.
Mayorkas said the department is currently evaluating how to expel Venezuelans at the border, a group that makes up a large part of migrants coming to America given the political and economic instability there.
The latest calls for Mayorkas to resign come shortly after U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Chris Magnus resigned from his position after being asked to do so by President Biden.
“This is his moment in time to do his job. But at any time if someone is derelict in their job, there is always the option of impeaching somebody,” McCarthy said at an April press conference in Eagle Pass, Texas.
But he later tamped down expectations for impeachment, saying that he does not want the procedure to be political as he claimed Democrats' impeachment of former President Trump was. McCarthy reiterated that sentiment on Tuesday in El Paso.
“We never do impeachment for political purposes. We’re having investigation,” McCarthy said.
“We know exactly what Secretary Mayorkas has done. We've watched across this nation, something that’s never happened before. We watched him time and again before committee say this border is secure, and we can't find one border agent who agrees with him,” McCarthy said. “So we will investigate. If investigation leads to impeachment inquiry, we will follow through.”
Correction: An earlier version of this report misstated the vote count for Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D-Calif.) nomination in 2019.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has a math problem.
He won the House GOP’s nomination to be Speaker this week in a 188-31 vote.
But far more GOP members voted against him than he can afford to lose on the floor Jan. 3 in a vote that would officially elect him Speaker. A vocal faction of Republicans who have the potential to make or break his Speakership continue to withhold support.
Recent 2022 election projections put Republicans on track to win up to 222 seats, a much slimmer majority than they were expecting before Election Day. Just a handful of Republican defectors could sink McCarthy.
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“The hard thing for Kevin, realistically, is there are a fair number of people who have said very publicly they're ‘Never Kevin.’ Like, there's nothing that Kevin can do to get their vote,” said Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio), who declined to share his own thinking on McCarthy.
Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), the former chair of the right-wing House Freedom Caucus who challenged McCarthy for the Speaker nomination, have outright pledged not to vote for McCarthy on the House floor.
But other critics of McCarthy aren’t going quite that far.
The questions are, how many skeptics can he sway to his side? What do they want in return? And, who could the alternative be?
McCarthy has projected confidence that he will win the votes he needs by January. He noted that former Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) was nominated 200-43 in 2015 before winning 236 votes the next day on the floor, and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) was nominated 203-32 before winning 220 on the House floor in 2019. Both Pelosi and Ryan, however, had more substantial majorities.
“Look, we have our work cut out for us. We've got to have a small majority. We've got to listen to everybody in our conference,” McCarthy said in a press conference after clinching the closed-door nomination.
His supporters also note that some who voted against McCarthy via secret ballot will not want to be on the record publicly opposing him in January. But skeptics are pushing back.
“The Leader does not have 218 votes,” said Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.), the current chair of the Freedom Caucus. “It is becoming increasingly perilous as we move forward.”
The magic number
McCarthy does not necessarily need 218 floor votes to win the Speakership, however. It is a technical point that may affect his road to the gavel with such a narrow margin.
A House Speaker needs to win a majority of votes of those casting a ballot for a candidate. That means unforeseen circumstances on everything from the coronavirus pandemic to the weather can make the difference.
Pelosi won the Speakership last year with 216 votes, due to vacancies and absences. Former Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) also won the Speakership with just 216 votes in 2015, when 25 members did not vote. Snowy weather kept some members away, and many Democrats were attending a funeral for the late New York Gov. Mario Cuomo (D).
A Congressional Research Service reportalso notes that “present” votes also lower the final number needed to win, with current House practice dictating that the Speaker needs to win a majority “voting by surname.”
Some House Republicans, then, could opt to vote “present” rather than for either McCarthy or an alternative candidate without jeopardizing McCarthy’s path to the gavel.
But there is no guarantee that members opposed to McCarthy will give him that leeway. Gaetz has said he will vote for someone else in January.
Demands for rules and vision
The House Freedom Caucus over the summer released a list of rule change demands for both the House GOP Conference and the House as a whole that aim to reduce the power of leadership and distribute more of it to individual members.
“I refuse to elect the same people utilizing the same rules that keep us from – members like me from participating,” Rep. Matt Rosendale (R-Mont.) said on former Trump adviser Stephen Bannon’s “War Room” show.
House Republicans began considering changes to their internal rules last week, and in a response to the push to decentralize power, McCarthy said after the meeting that the conference increased the number of representative regions from 13 to 19. The move affects the power in the House GOP steering committee, the body of members that control committee assignments and chairmanships.
“The regional maps we just did, pushing the power further down to more regions, more to the conference itself,” McCarthy said, which “dilutes the power greater to the members” on the steering committee.
The House GOP also passed an amendment from Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) that prohibits members of the House Republican Conference steering committee from sitting on the National Republican Congressional Committee’s executive committee — with an exception for elected members of the House GOP conference.
But other proposals from Freedom Caucus members were shot down, and some did not leave the session happy.
“I was disappointed about how the rules meeting was conducted,” Perry said, adding that other members and representatives-elect were “aghast at how that meeting was conducted and the product that came out of it.”
“Unless something changes, they should get used to that, because the tenor of that meeting was exactly what I've experienced throughout my time in Congress,” Perry added.
And for some members still withholding support from McCarthy, the rules are not the only factor in their decision.
Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) said he wants commitments on a federal budget. Biggs has expressed disappointment that McCarthy will not commit to impeachment proceedings against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. Others stress the need for strong leadership and vision without offering many specifics.
If not McCarthy, then who?
As the saying goes in politics, you can’t beat somebody with nobody, and those opposed to McCarthy lack a viable alternative.
Biggs imagines that by Jan. 3, there will be more of a consensus candidate, and that it might not be him.
“I can think of probably 20 people who nobody's mad at ever,” Biggs said, throwing out Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.) as a suggestion. “I don't think people get mad at him too often.”
Johnson was reelected to be vice chair of the House GOP and has shown no interest in being an alternative Speaker candidate.
Some conservatives have suggested Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), a founding Freedom Caucus member who challenged McCarthy for GOP Leader in 2018. But Jordan, who is likely to chair the House Judiciary Committee, has thrown his support behind McCarthy.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), once a doubter of McCarthy’s ability to become Speaker, has become one of his most vocal supporters for the post.
She has warned that moderate Republicans could join Democrats and elect a compromise moderate Speaker. McCarthy skeptics have dismissed that prospect as a “red herring.” McCarthy has also said he will not seek Democratic votes to be Speaker.
Greene said she would lobby her right-wing colleagues to support McCarthy, and on Friday, she said that the number of members not supporting McCarthy are “going down some, which is a good sign.”
“I really feel like our conference needs to be unified. We need to support Kevin McCarthy and we need to lead in such a way that we show the American people that the Republicans have their act together,” Greene said.
Former Rep. Justin Amash (Mich.) has offered to serve as a “nonpartisan” Speaker of the House if Republicans and Democrats cannot agree on a candidate from either party to fill the post.
The offer from Amash, a former Republican-turned-Libertarian lawmaker, comes as House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) faces opposition from some members of his party, complicating his Speakership bid.
“If neither party has the votes to elect a speaker of the House, I’d be happy to serve as a nonpartisan speaker who ensures the institution works as it’s supposed to—a place where all ideas are welcome and where outcomes are discovered through the process, not dictated from above,” Amash said in a tweet on Tuesday.
Amash was elected as a Republican in the 2010 Tea Party wave, and built a reputation of being staunchly critical of the top-down nature of congressional power. He was the first Republican to call for then-President Trump’s impeachment in 2019 and later that year left the GOP to become an independent.
In 2020, Amash registered as a Libertarian, becoming the party’s first member of Congress. He considered running for president as a third-party candidate but decided against it, and left the House at the end of his term.
The Speaker is not required to be an elected member of Congress, but every one so far has been.
House Republicans chose McCarthy as their nominee for Speaker in closed-door, secret-ballot elections on Tuesday. But he faced a last-minute protest challenge from Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), former chair of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, who has knocked McCarthy’s plans for House rules management and his reluctance to pursue impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
McCarthy easily won the House GOP Speaker nomination over Biggs, 188 to 31. But he will have to win a majority of votes on the House floor — 218 votes, assuming a fully sworn-in House — in order to win the gavel.
With an expected slim majority for House Republicans, McCarthy will have just a few votes to spare for Republican defections on the House floor — far fewer than 31. McCarthy and his allies project confidence that he will win the floor vote, but it is unclear how many Republicans are set on voting against him.
Not every member of the Freedom Caucus agrees with challenging McCarthy, though. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) has thrown her support behind McCarthy, arguing that division among Republicans could lead some moderate defectors to join with Democrats and elect a less conservative Speaker as a compromise.
Election projections as of Wednesday morning put Republicans just one seat away from securing the House majority, with nine seats undecided. Republicans are confident they will win control of the chamber.
There is historical precedent for a fair amount of uncertainty in Speakership elections — it took two months and 133 ballots to elect Speaker Nathaniel P. Banks in 1856, according to the House historian — and the GOP's majority come January is expected to be its narrowest in decades.
A major factor at play for the McCarthy antagonists are proposed House and GOP Conference rules changes. The House Freedom Caucus has proposed rules changes that, on the whole, would chip away at leadership’s power and give more to individual members. That aligns with the argument from Amash, who was a founding member of the Freedom Caucus, but left the group around the time he left the GOP.
The House GOP will start consideration of internal conference rules changes on Wednesday afternoon. In an olive branch to the Freedom Caucus concerns, McCarthy on Tuesday said that the House GOP would consider just half of the rules change requests on Wednesday and the other half after Thanksgiving.
House Republicans nominated Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) to be Speaker in a closed-door conference meeting on Tuesday after he faced a last-minute protest challenge from Rep. Andy Biggs (Ariz.), a former chairman of the conservative House Freedom Caucus.
McCarthy won easily, 188 to 31, in the internal conference meeting. But in the eyes of Biggs and his supporters, the goal was merely to demonstrate that McCarthy lacks the support to seize the gavel when the full House meets to choose the Speaker early next year.
The 31 votes opposing McCarthy easily met that threshold, raising immediate questions about how McCarthy — who had failed to ascend to Speaker in 2015 — will make up the difference between now and then.
The secret-ballot House Republican Conference vote is just the first step for McCarthy to take hold of the gavel. He must win a majority in a public vote on the House floor — at least 218 votes, assuming a fully sworn-in House — on the first day of the next Congress on Jan. 3.
Tuesday’s vote came as the final breakdown of House control remains unknown, with around a dozen races undecided and election projections putting Republicans just one vote shy of securing the majority.
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The exact size of the slimmer-than-expected majority will have major implications for the rest of McCarthy’s path to the gavel, since he will be able to spare only a handful of defectors on the House floor. Rules changes and committee assignments may be among the bargaining chips McCarthy uses to woo opponents back to his side before Jan. 3.
Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), a Freedom Caucus member who nominated Biggs for Speaker during the conference meeting on Tuesday, said that his position on McCarthy’s chances at becoming Speaker remained unchanged after Tuesday’s nomination.
“No one has 218 (or close, as needed). We have to sit down and establish the fundamental changes needed,” Roy said in a statement.
In a press conference, McCarthy said he thinks he will have the votes by January to become Speaker, pointing out that former Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and current Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif) similarly fell short of 218 votes in their internal party nominations before later securing the Speakership on the House floor. But he acknowledged it could be tough.
"Look, we have our work cut out for us. We've got to have a small majority. We've got to listen to everybody in our conference," McCarthy said.
But Biggs said on former Trump adviser Stephen Bannon’s “War Room” podcast on Tuesday that there are a “significant number of hard noes” for McCarthy in the House GOP.
The Freedom Caucus is pushing for changes to internal conference rules that, on the whole, would chip away at leadership’s power and give more to individual members — a major dynamic at play in Biggs’s challenge to McCarthy.
One of those requests is restoring any member’s ability to make a motion to vacate the chair, which would force a recall vote on the Speaker. Then-Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), a Freedom Caucus co-founder, made the motion in 2015, contributing to a rebellion that ended in former GOP Speaker John Boehner (Ohio) resigning from Congress later that year.
McCarthy is opposed to the change, arguing that it would give too much power to Democratic members.
The House GOP conference was set to vote on rules on Wednesday, much to the frustration of Freedom Caucus members, who requested that a vote on the rules happen before leadership elections.
But in what may be a sign of McCarthy being willing to negotiate more on rules, he announced on Tuesday that some rules changes would be considered on Wednesday and others considered after Thanksgiving, according to a person with knowledge of the meeting.
Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), a 36-year House veteran, acknowledged that McCarthy has his work cut out for him.
"Nothing's easy," said Upton, who's retiring at the end of this term. "He's going to work hard, I'm sure."
Upton said the dynamics remind him of the race to replace Boehner in 2015, when conservative opposition forced McCarthy to drop out of the contest. But with one major difference.
"Unlike before when, in essence, Kevin threw in the towel, he's not going to do it this time," Upton said. "They had an easy path before when Kevin backed off. He's not backing off this time."
Both supporters and opponents of McCarthy acknowledged a major difference between the internal nomination vote and the Jan. 3 vote that could improve McCarthy’s level of support: On the House floor, votes will be public and not secret — likely influencing those who do not want to upset McCarthy to vote for him.
Biggs launched a late challenge to McCarthy on Monday night and did not make a presentation beforehand at a House GOP leadership candidate forum, during which McCarthy got standing ovations.
“We have a new paradigm here, and I think the country wants a different direction from the House of Representatives,” Biggs said on Newsmax Monday night. He has previously expressed disappointment with McCarthy downplaying the prospects of impeachment for Biden administration officials like Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
Reps. Michael Cloud (Texas) and Ralph Norman (S.C.) seconded Roy’s nomination of Biggs in the conference meeting on Tuesday, according to a source in the room. Rep. Kelly Armstrong (N.D.) was among those who gave a speech in support of McCarthy.
Not all members of the Freedom Caucus agree with the tactic of challenging McCarthy, however.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), once a doubter of McCarthy’s ability to become Speaker, has become one of his most vocal supporters for the post — as she hopes to secure favorable committee assignments in the next Congress. A slim majority, she fears, could cause moderate Republicans to join Democrats and elect a compromise moderate candidate.
“We have to elect Kevin McCarthy,” Greene told reporters Monday. “I can’t support a challenge that will allow the Democrats to elect their own Speaker by pulling some of ours.”
The Speakership has been a longtime goal for McCarthy, who has been active in Republican politics since his young adulthood.
“Can I be Speaker?” McCarthy said in jest to a member presiding over the House at one point during an overnight, record-breaking speech on the House floor last year, when he delayed passage of a major Democratic tax, climate and spending bill.
After rising to minority leader in the California State Assembly, the Bakersfield, Calif., Republican was elected to the U.S. House in 2006, eventually rising through the leadership ranks from chief deputy whip to whip to majority leader.
But Biggs’s challenge is the latest chapter in the saga of McCarthy battling and wooing the House GOP’s right flank.
First came the conservative opposition that sank his 2015 Speakership bid, and then in 2018, Rep. Jim Jordan (Ohio), another member of the House Freedom Caucus, challenged him in the race for GOP leader.
But as the top House Republican for the last four years, McCarthy has given the right flank a seat at the table, unlike some of his leadership predecessors.
Jordan is set to become chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and is fully supporting McCarthy. Greene was invited to participate in McCarthy’s “Commitment to America” policy platform rollout in September.
And perhaps most notably, McCarthy quickly mended his relationship with former President Trump after saying that Trump bore responsibility for the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack, traveling to Mar-a-Lago to meet with him weeks later.
Trump threw his support behind McCarthy for Speaker before last week’s elections. McCarthy has not endorsed the former president running for a third time in 2024, which Trump is expected to announce Tuesday night.
Rep. Andy Biggs (Ariz.) late Monday announced a run for Speaker, challenging House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) in the Republican conference’s nomination to the post.
“We have a new paradigm here, and I think the country wants a different direction from the House of Representatives. And it’s a new world, and, yes, I’m going to be nominated tomorrow to — to the position of Speaker of the House,” Biggs said on Newmax on Monday night.
“We’ll see if we can get the job done and the votes,” Biggs said. “It’s going to be tough. I mean, Kevin — Kevin has raised a lot of money and done a lot of things. But this is not just about Kevin. I think it’s about the institutional direction and trajectory.”
The challenge from Biggs, a former chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, comes as House Republicans’ expectations of a red wave crashed into a ripple in last week’s midterms. Election projections have not yet called a majority of House seats in Republicans’ favor, but the GOP believes it will end up with a slim majority.
McCarthy needs to win a majority of votes from House GOP members in a secret-ballot election on Tuesday to secure his conference’s nomination for the post. After that, all House members will vote on the floor on the first day of the new Congress in January, when McCarthy would need at least 218 votes to secure the Speakership, assuming all 435 members are sworn in that day.
Biggs did not step up as an alternative to McCarthy at a House GOP leadership candidate forum on Monday afternoon, according to sources in the room.
Bigg’s challenge comes as the Freedom Caucus is pressing GOP leadership to make rules changes that, on the whole, would empower individual members and weaken the power of leadership.
His plan to challenge McCarthy, however, is not supported by all Freedom Caucus members.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) warned that Republicans in a slim majority face risks if they are not unified behind one candidate and that a handful of moderate House Republicans could join Democrats to support a compromise Speaker candidate.
"We have to elect Kevin McCarthy,” Greene told reporters Monday. “I can't support a challenge that will allow the Democrats to — to elect their own speaker by pulling some of ours.”
She added that she is trying to talk to her colleagues who are hesitant about supporting McCarthy to convince them to support the GOP leader.
In a validation of those fears, Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.), a moderate, told NBC News on Monday that he would theoretically vote with Democrats to support a consensus candidate if McCarthy could not get 218 votes on the floor. But Bacon later stressed to reporters that he thinks McCarthy will get to that number and that working with Democrats is “not even a realistic scenario.”
There are concerns about who would be the consensus alternative 218 House Republicans could support on the floor. Freedom Caucus members helped to derail McCarthy’s Speakership bid in 2015 after former Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) resigned, resulting in Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) becoming Speaker, which was later seen as a disappointment to some Freedom Caucus members.
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), who previously challenged McCarthy to lead House Republicans, has been brought up by Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), who is not a member of the Freedom Caucus, as a possible alternative. But Jordan, who is set to chair the House Judiciary Committee in a GOP majority, has repeatedly said that he supports McCarthy for Speaker.
Biggs told reporters last week that McCarthy’s reluctance to bring up impeachment articles made him question whether he should be Speaker. Biggs has introduced impeachment articles against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and joined impeachment resolutions against President Biden and Attorney General Merrick Garland.
“I think that his statement recently that [we] shouldn't impeach Secretary Mayorkas indicates maybe we're not gonna be as aggressive going forward as we should be,” Biggs said last week.
McCarthy has downplayed prospects for bringing up impeachment multiple times, saying that he does not want to use it for “political purposes.”
Biggs also called for more “decentralization” of the conference and a more robust policy and oversight plan. “We need to have a very positive statement of what we're going to accomplish and do, and I haven't seen that yet,” he said last week.
McCarthy led House Republicans in releasing a “Commitment to America” policy and messaging plan for a House majority in September, but some Freedom Caucus members think that it was not explicit enough about plans for the majority.
Supporters of McCarthy are brushing off Biggs’s bid.
“I’ve got respect for Mr. Biggs. But at the end of the day, Kevin McCarthy is our best strategist. He’s our best fundraiser. He’s our best recruiter. He did more to retake the majority than anybody in the entire conference,” said Rep. Guy Reschenthaler (R-Pa.), adding that not giving McCarthy the gavel now “would be an insult.”
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) argued against any challenge to House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) atop the GOP conference, worrying that it could have unintended negative consequences in a slim majority.
"I actually think that’s a bad strategy when we’re looking at having a very razor-thin majority, with potentially 219 — we’re talking about one vote," Greene said on former Trump adviser Stephen Bannon’s "War Room" podcast Monday morning.
Greene’s comments came amid reports that Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), a former chairman of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, is weighing a protest run against McCarthy.
Biggs told reporters Monday afternoon that no one currently has 218 votes to be Speaker. His spokesman told The Hill there will be an alternative challenger to McCarthy but did not confirm it would be Biggs.
A handful of moderate House Republicans could join Democrats to support a compromise Speaker candidate such as Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), Greene warned Monday.
"It's very, very risky right now to produce a leadership challenge, especially for Speaker of the House, when they are going to open the door and allow Liz Cheney, possibly, to become Speaker," Greene said on the podcast.
Cheney will not return to Congress next year, but House rules allow for a nonmember to be elected Speaker. Such a scenario, though, is not considered serious, and she is not campaigning for the post.
Greene last year doubted McCarthy would have the votes to be Speaker but has since grown close with the GOP leader. She was included at a House GOP platform event in Pennsylvania in September, and she is hoping to be placed on the House Oversight and Reform Committee after McCarthy vowed to restore her membership in committees as Speaker.
“I think that to be the best Speaker of the House and to please the base, he’s going to give me a lot of power and a lot of leeway,” Greene said in a New York Times magazine profile published last month.
House Republicans are scheduled to elect conference leaders on Tuesday, which includes nominating a Speaker candidate. The nominee needs a majority of House Republicans in a secret ballot to get the nomination and then a majority — at least 218 votes in a fully sworn-in chamber — on the House floor to win the Speakership on the first day of the new Congress in January.
Conservative members of the House, including multiple members of the House Freedom Caucus, have withheld support for McCarthy over his resistance to rules change demands from the caucus that would chip away at leadership’s power.
Biggs told reporters last week that McCarthy’s reluctance to bring up impeachment articles — he has said multiple times that he would not pursue a “political” impeachment — made him question whether McCarthy should be Speaker.
The Arizona congressman has introduced impeachment articles against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
“I think that his statement recently that we shouldn't impeach Secretary Mayorkas indicates maybe we're not gonna be as aggressive going forward as we should be,” Biggs told reporters last week.
Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) has preemptively endorsed former President Trump for another White House bid ahead of his scheduled “special announcement” at Mar-a-Lago on Tuesday.
“I am proud to endorse Donald J. Trump for President in 2024. I fully support him running again,” Stefanik said in a statement to Breitbart News. “Under his presidency, America was strong at home and abroad, our economy was red hot, our border was secure, our neighborhoods were safe, our law enforcement was respected, and our enemies feared us.”
“We cannot afford another four years of Joe Biden’s failed policies that have led to the inflation crisis, border crisis, and crime crisis. It is time for Republicans to unite around the most popular Republican in America, who has a proven track record of conservative governance,” Stefanik said.
Stefanik is currently the chair of the House Republican Conference, the No. 3 position in the House GOP. She is running for reelection to that post, which would be the No. 4 position if Republicans win a majority in the chamber.
Trump endorsed Stefanik for another term as Conference Chair this week ahead of the midterm elections.
“I think she’s fantastic,” he told Fox News.
Her full-throated support of Trump comes as many in the Republican Party are growing more vocal about wanting Trump to step back from politics after the midterm elections fell well short of Republican expectations of a red wave.
Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), who is retiring from Congress, said on CNN that Trump’s inserting himself into primaries “changed the nature of the race and that created just too much of an obstacle.” Former Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said that Trump is “a drag on our ticket” and “gives us problems politically.”
Stefanik, though, asserted that “it’s very clear President Trump is the leader of the Republican party.”
“It is time for Republicans to unite around the most popular Republican in America, who has a proven track record of conservative governance. Poll after poll shows that President Trump would defeat any Republican challenger by massive margins, and would beat Joe Biden if the election were held today,” she said.
When Stefanik entered Congress in 2015 — then the youngest woman ever elected to the House — she had a notably moderate tone and voting record. Heritage Action, the advocacy arm of the influential conservative think tank, gave her just a 29 percent score on her first congressional session.
But as Trump rose to power, she embraced him. She was on Trump’s defense team during his first impeachment in 2019, drastically raising her profile and putting her in good graces with the then-president.
After Rep. Liz Cheney (N.Y.) was ousted from the GOP Conference chair position by House Republicans in 2021 for continuing to criticize Trump after the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, Stefanik easily replaced her, despite grumbles from some House Republicans over whether she was sufficiently conservative.
Now, Stefanik proudly calls herself “ultra-MAGA.”
Trump has already begun taking aim at his expected GOP primary rivals, calling out Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis ahead of their own expected bids.
“The Fake News asks him if he’s going to run if President Trump runs, and he says, ‘I’m only focused on the Governor’s race, I’m not looking into the future,’” Trump wrote.
“Well, in terms of loyalty and class, that’s really not the right answer.”
