House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, the front-runner to become the next House speaker, had just unexpectedly pulled out of the race, throwing the GOP into turmoil and leaving the contest for speaker wide open.
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Ryan, who was the GOP nominee for vice president in 2012, has said he wants to focus on the Ways and Means Committee, include a possible overhaul of the tax code, and has expressed concerns about the demands on his family if he were speaker.
On Friday, Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan responded to pressure and announced he would consider running for speaker of the House. “I do think there are other people that are better qualified, but I do think I’d bridge that gap”.
To un-stick the House from the muck of intractable conflict, Ryan would have to make deals with members of both parties on raising the debt ceiling, passing a budget and more, said one Republican who supports him.
Rep. Dave Brat and other members have circulated a set of principles they say will require any speaker candidate to adhere to, including changing Republican conference rules to give conservatives more say in chairmanships and ease the ability to get a bill to the floor. “He’s been very good to me the last five years that I’ve been in Congress”. Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) has a lot of sense and I hope he runs.
Speaker hopeful Chaffetz went on ABC’s Sunday news show “This Week”, to make his case for the position. One of those is firebrand King, who said Friday he still firmly supports Webster.
But it’s not clear Ryan is interested in the job.
“We need a new face”, McCarthy said after a closed-door meeting where House Republicans had been prepared to nominate him as speaker but instead learned he was taking himself out of the running.
On defunding Planned Parenthood, House Freedom Caucus members oppose any spending bill that would provide funds for the nation’s leading abortion provider.
“Here’s the interesting thing, kicked off the Agriculture Committee and he’s got a PhD in agriculture policy”, Jordan said, adding, “that’s the kind of stuff that has to stop”.
“The White House would like that idea”, Allen said.
“I did everything except carry his gym bag this morning trying to get him to do it, “California Rep. Darrell Issa said”. Still, he thought that getting the support of every single House Republican is “just not reasonable”. “We all know that”, Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Pa., said on NBC’s “Meet the Press”. “[Daniel Webster’s] conservative voting record is much different than mine, but he ran the House of Representatives and the Senate in Florida in a way that brought people together”.
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“I’m hearing probably about 30 or 40 names are being knocked around at this point”, Rose Wing, chairwoman of the Cobb County Republican Party, said Thursday evening.
