Dem
51
GOP
49
"Democrats are in disarray" is a staple of political writing. Whenever a pundit has nothing else to say, he or she can write a piece about "Democrats are in disarray" and everyone nods "yes, of course." "Republicans are in disarray" is like "man bites dog." Politico's cartoonist, Matt Wuerker expressed the current situation in—as you might expect—a cartoon:
So what happens now? One thing Republicans DO NOT WANT is another 15-round vote-a-thon that drags on for days, like the one that began on Jan. 3 of this year. So they recessed the House for a week to see if they could find a candidate who can get 218 votes. This time they want to do the wheeling and dealing privately and not make fools of themselves in front of the whole country. Who said Republicans can't learn from experience?
Specifically, next Tuesday the Republicans will be holding a closed-door candidate forum, in which all the potential candidates can address the conference and make their pitches. Once they have all made their case, there is likely to be a straw poll of some kind to see if anyone can get to 218.
Rep. Mike Garcia (R-CA) and other battleground Republicans have said that the ousting of McCarthy "weakens our position." Rep. Frank Lucas (R-OK) said: "It's one thing to burn the building down. It's another to put it back together." All the speaker wannabes (speakers wannabe?) know that they will have to pass a budget in about 6 weeks—or kick the can down the road again. They also know that any budget the Freedom Caucus finds acceptable will never get the votes of the Biden 18 and has no chance of passing the Senate. The only way for a speaker to succeed is to be bipartisan and get 30 or more Democrats to go along. Part of any deal with the Democrats would have to be an agreement that they will support the new speaker on future motions to vacate the chair. With enough concessions, that would be doable. We don't see any other viable alternative, really.
Despite the fact that the job is really unattractive (except for the pay: the speaker gets $223,500 and regular members get $174,000), there appear to be folks who want to try. The obvious candidate is the #2 House Republican, Steve Scalise (R-LA). He might be able to get to 218. He officially jumped in yesterday. But he is close to McCarthy and people who don't like McCarthy generally don't like Scalise either. Also, Scalise has health issues that could be a problem. On June 14, 2017, a left-wing madman shot him in the hip at a practice session for the annual Congressional Baseball Game. Scalise suffered severe internal organ damage and almost died. He had multiple surgeries and was in the ICU for weeks. On Aug. 29, 2023, he announced that he has been diagnosed with multiple myeloma and is undergoing treatment with chemotherapy. Scalise has spoken warmly of Donald Trump but has not endorsed him. This might not be the right time for him to take on a very difficult and thankless job.
Next in line after Scalise is Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-MN). In Dutch, "emmer" means "pail" or "bucket." Useful when you have to mop up a mess. Alternatively, these days, the speakership might be another job that is not worth an emmer of warme pis. Emmer is in the MN-06 seat of Michelle Bachman, who was Marjorie Taylor Greene before Marjorie Taylor Greene was Marjorie Taylor Greene. Before being elected to the U.S. House in 2014, he served three terms in the Minnesota House and ran for governor in 2010 and barely lost to Mark Dayton. Emmer is a conservative Republican. He opposes abortion, laws banning bullying of LGBTQ+ people, laws dealing with climate change, the Affordable Care Act, same-sex marriage, and the minimum wage. He supports mining in the national forests, cryptocurrencies, banning immigration from Muslim countries, and allowing pharmacists to refuse to dispense contraceptives they don't approve of. He has written things that some people have interpreted as antisemitic. Emmer has said that the federal indictments of Donald Trump are "the ultimate abuse of power." Emmer is chairman of the NRCC. Think of him as Kevin McCarthy but with less charisma. The Freedom Caucusers aren't likely to go for him. He's more of the same. Although Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) likes him, so maybe he could get to 218.
Next in the pecking order is Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY). She might take the job if it were handed to her, but we don't expect her to actively pursue it. On the other hand, Rep. Tom Cole (R-OK) is definitely interested. His mother is a Chickasaw Native American. He has an M.A. from Yale and a Ph.D. from the University of Oklahoma, both in British History. After his Ph.D. he was a Fulbright Fellow at the University of London and later a professor of history. He's clearly quite smart, as that is a requirement to be a professor of history. He has been in the House since Jan. 2003 and has since risen to a position of great power. He is now chairman of the House Rules Committee. He opposes abortion and supported Donald Trump's attempt to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. He voted against creating the Jan. 6 Committee.
Another potential candidate is Rep. Kevin Hern (R-OK). Oops. Another Kevin. He's pretty Trumpy, so Trump could just keep calling the speaker "My Kevin," rather than having to learn a new name. He's got a Ph.D. in aeronautical engineering from Georgia Tech, so he is no dummy. But he didn't work as an engineer. He worked as an operations manager for McDonalds. Before too long, he owned 18 McDonalds franchises and became rich. He now owns a hog farm, a bank, and a number of other companies. On his federal form, he listed his assets as worth between $39 million and $93 million. He was elected to the House in 2018. He is against immigration, even for skilled immigrants on H-1B visas. He also opposed admitting Afghans who helped the U.S. military in Afghanistan (e.g., as translators), even though this means most of them are likely to be imprisoned, in the best case. He is chairman of the Republican Study Committee, the largest conservative caucus.
One member whose chance is as close to zero as you can get without being zero (mathematicians would say: "less than epsilon for all epsilon") is Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH). He is a fire-breathing radical who makes Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) look positively tame. Getting 30 votes from the Freedom Caucus would be easy. The next 188 votes would be quite a bit tougher. The "moderates" in the 18 districts Joe Biden won would be "no" votes from ballot 1 to ballot infinity. Nevertheless, yesterday, he announced a run for the job. Centrist members may remember how he forced out former Speaker John Boehner, a fellow Ohioan. With him, everything he does is performative. From a political point of view, he would be the Democrats' ideal speaker. He will shut down the government, ruin the credit of the United States, and do whatever it takes to make every independent in the country vote a straight Democratic ticket.
As the horse trading goes on, dark horse candidates could emerge this week. A couple of members have suggested that Donald Trump be elected speaker. Problem is that it is actually a day job. You have to show up and do the work. That's not for him. He has to be in court too much. Another problem is that House rules forbid someone who is under indictment from serving as a committee chair, or in leadership. He just might be disqualified by this rule. Darn! Missed it by that much.
What is important, but hard to characterize, is a candidate's "likeability." A candidate with extreme views but who is a nice person and has many friends in the Republican caucus could do better than a candidate with moderate views who is considered a real jerk. That said, "real jerk" and "extreme views" tend to go hand-in-hand (see: Gaetz, Matt; Cruz, Ted; Paul, Rand).
Another thing to keep in mind is that the rules could play a role in the speaker election. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) doesn't get to vote for speaker, but he is nevertheless calling for a rule change to get rid of the whole "motion to vacate" business so this doesn't happen again. Good thing the Kentuckian is not running for speaker, because he would get no votes at all from the Freedom Caucus with that platform. What will be interesting to see is how Scalise, Emmer, and the others respond when House Republicans ask them about the rule. If anyone says he is for keeping the rule, he might get the job, but would then become a wholly owned subsidiary of Matt Gaetz. Other interesting questions relate to working with the Democrats, the budget, etc. (V)