October 19, 2023
We may get a House Speaker today.
But it’s not going to be Jim Jordan.
Is it Kevin McCarthy?
No.
Is it Steve Scalise?
No.
Hakeem Jeffries.
No.
It’s probably going to be the current appointed Speaker Pro Tem Patrick McHenry of North Carolina – at least temporarily.
About an hour ago, Representative Jim Jordan decided to cancel a third house floor vote because honestly – he kept losing Republican support. Instead, Jordan is now reportedly behind another plan to try and expand the powers of the Speaker Pro Tem until January. But he’s not dropping out of the Speaker race…this plan allows him to continues to work on getting the votes he needs for himself to become the Speaker. At this point – Jordan’s plan does not have the support of the full Republican conference. There is a group who are absolutely opposed and would rather keep voting for Jordan on the House floor.
So that means – the reality is– if Republicans want to get the house open and working again they’re going to have to get Democrat support. Now – in the past, Democrats have said they could support a person like McHenry – but there’s also going to have to be some kind of deal about a lot of things like — how long McHenry will hold this power, what exactly will his legislative powers be – will they be the same as a fully elected house speaker? And what is going to happen when his powers expire?
Look – the fact is – in American history this has never happened before. Obviously, Congress has the power to govern itself, so if this is the deal they come up with, it gets 217 yes votes — then that’s what it’ll be. But still there are a lot of question about how this going to work
