House Republicans are now scheduled for a closed-door conference meeting Thursday to select their leadership winners.
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“As a man of the House and a former member of the House leadership, I know that Kevin McCarthy is the person we need as speaker in these unsafe and important times”, said Cheney, who represented Wyoming in the House for 12 years.
Mr. McCarthy’s misstep in a televised interview might give an edge to the brasher and less experienced Jason Chaffetz of Utah, who says he can unify the Republican conference and deliver the GOP message more forcefully.
McCarthy retracted the comment and said he regrets it. “We’re ready for change in Washington, not more of the same. We got a couple of days to pull together a few kind of consensus”. That will be followed by a floor vote in the full House on October 29.
So on Thursday, a secret-ballot election will be held among Republicans, but only for speaker.
Rep. Kevin McCarthy’s ascent to speaker of the House is no longer the cinch that it was supposed to be just one week ago. Since January the caucus has grown to over 30 members and most pundits admit they had a big play in getting rid of Boehner. None of the rising conservative stars ended up mounting a bid for speaker, and they’ve so far have been unable to coalesce around any of the announced candidates, despite an effort to learn from the past and avoid internal divisions.
The Associated Press reported that McCaul thanked Boehner for his “distinguished career”, and added that, “I wish him well in his retirement”.
The other candidate is conservative Representative Daniel Webster of Florida.
“We were entrusted by the American people with the largest majority the Republicans have ever had since Babe Ruth was swinging the baseball bat”, Chaffetz told Fox News Channel’s Chris Wallace. “We are looking for specifics-not just assurances, but guarantees”.
Chaffetz has been vague about the agenda he’d pursue as Speaker, other than saying he’d let House committees dictate the policies.
House conservatives – a large enough voting bloc to influence the outcome of GOP leadership elections – grilled candidates for speaker behind closed doors Tuesday evening. “He said it wasn’t a good choice of words”. Price is seen as the underdog in the majority leader’s race against Rep. Steve Scalise, R-Louisiana.
Sessions is running against Rep. Patrick McHenry of North Carolina, the current chief deputy whip, and Reps.
McCarthy remains the favorite and has Boehner’s support, but conservatives say they will not back him unless they’re convinced he’ll take the House in a new direction.
But after more than two hours, they weren’t able to come to a decision on who they will endorse – if anyone at all. “How will you treat people fairly?” He later said he wanted to vote with the Freedom Caucus. “I’m not giving up on anything there”, he said. “He handled it how you would want a leader to”.
Outgoing House Speaker John Boehner has ripped up the script for how Congress will tackle the next debt ceiling deadline.
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Jordan, who has denied requests from Freedom Caucus members to run for speaker himself, wants members to unite as a bloc behind a candidate, rather than peel off separately. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C.-are not running. “I resented that. And one of his staffers had a conversation with my staff that was not very congenial”. So my questions will be the same for all three candidates. Their arguments reached a fever pitch after videos surfaced showing Planned Parenthood executives discussing how they harvest tissue from aborted fetuses for scientific research.
