What will the Freedom Caucus tell us about the Speakership and Senate Majority Change? A CNN Analysis of McCarthy’s Campaign in the House of Representatives

If all members vote, McCarthy would be able to achieve the speakership, but only if he gets 218 votes. McCarthy needs the support of four Republicans and a long list of GOP lawmakers who say they will vote against him to survive.

“I’ve heard from multiple of my constituents who question the wisdom of proceeding forward with that leadership,” Biggs said, adding that there needs to be a “frank conversation” about who they elect for the top job.

Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado said it was a “red line” for her, but not everyone in the Freedom Caucus is united on whether to make that a hard line.

McCarthy supporters could try to kick critics off their committees if they don’t fall into line and threaten to work with the Democrats to get a more moderate speaker. At one point, the group even started wearing “O.K.” buttons around the Capitol, which stands for “Only Kevin” – a joking nod to McCarthy’s opposition.

During that speaker vote, McCarthy will have a higher hurdle to clear. The full House holds a vote on the floor for Speaker and to win, a candidate needs to win a majority of all members, which amounts to 218 votes if no member skips the vote or votes “present.”

CNN has not yet projected which party will have control of the House of Representatives, as of Friday morning, the network has projected that Republicans have 211 seats to Democrats’ 198.

What Happened to the C Team in the First Half of the House GOP Campaign for the 2024 Republican Manipulative Reionization

Norman said the group wants to make a longer list of rules changes. McCarthy has yet to decide if he will delay the internal leadership elections next week.

When asked whether McCarthy should get credit for delivering the majority, Norman responded: “The taxpayers that voted the representatives in deserve the credit.”

The biggest problem Republican foes of McCarthy have right now is that there’s no Ryan. There isn’t a well-known and well-liked Republican waiting in the wings if McCarthy fails. It’s difficult to beat something with nothing.

“With a slim majority, we shouldn’t be starting the C team,” Gaetz said. It is necessary to place our star players in a position to shine so we can attract more people to our policies.

McCarthy is hoping that Trump’s endorsement will help win over some of the ardent Trump supporters who have been critical of McCarthy, sources said.

Trump aides and allies have been very critical of Tom Emmer, who heads the National Republican Congressional Committee. CNN has not yet projected which party will control the lower chamber, though Republicans appear on track to gain a narrow House majority. Emmer is competing against Rep. Jim Banks, an ally of Donald Trump Jr., for the position of House GOP whip.

A Republican source says that Trump has been asking to see which of his GOP colleagues have endorsed him in the media. So far, House GOP Conference Chair Elise Stefanik has been the highest-ranking Republican to officially back Trump’s 2024 bid.

The new House Republicans will begin their majority on Tuesday, without a clear idea of their leader who will be in charge. The conference will gather one last time before the speaker vote, where McCarthy supporters are hoping for a last-minute resolution but are bracing for the worst.

But if she runs again for leadership, such a move would also likely surprise, and even frustrate, many in Washington, including members of her own party, who have been anticipating that she might step aside for a new generation of leadership to take the reins.

Democratic Candidate General Rem Emmer: An Overview of the Campaign and the State of the House Democratic Leadership Elections (Revised Version)

Republicans are scheduled to hold a candidate forum on Monday evening, followed by leadership elections on Tuesday, November 15, according to a copy of the schedule shared with CNN.

If McCarthy doesn’t get the majority on Tuesday, it will be the first time in 100 years that a speaker has needed multiple votes to win.

House Democratic leadership elections will be held on Wednesday, November 30. Voting will take place behind closed doors via secret ballot using an app.

A candidate needs a majority of the people who are present and Voting to be elected to a post in Democratic leadership. If more than two candidates run and no one wins a majority, the candidate with the fewest votes after the first round of voting will be eliminated and voting will proceed to a second round. Until a candidate gets a majority, that process continues.

One thing the California Republican does have going for his dreams of the top job is the fact that there so far is not a strong alternative to his candidacy. The leader of the Freedom Caucus launched a long-shot bid.

Emmer told reporters he isn’t sure if a smaller majority will affect his bid. But his pitch to members is similar to McCarthy’s, saying: “we delivered.”

“Of course. The California Democrat told Bash that people are campaigning and that is a beautiful thing. I am not asking anyone for anything. My members are asking me to consider doing that. Let us just get through the election.

Sen. J. McConnell’s campaign for the House Minority Leader position: First results from the Freedom Caucus and a meeting with the House on Tuesday

Currently, Maryland Rep. Steny Hoyer serves as the No. 2 House Democrat, in the role of House majority leader, and South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn serves in the role of House majority whip. The assistant Speaker is from Massachusetts and the House Democratic caucus chair is from New York.

Democratic Rep. Joe Neguse of Colorado, who currently serves as the co-chair of the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee, has announced his run for caucus chair to replace Jeffries who is term limited.

The chair of the campaign arm of the party is under consideration after the chair of the party, Sean Patrick Maloney, lost his reelection.

On Friday Republican Rep. Ami Bera of California and Democrat Tony Cardenas of California announced their intent to run for the spot.

But it also reflected Greene’s growing personal power, after she broke with some radical GOP members and lined up to support McCarthy’s speakership. After coming to Congress as a fringe figure and losing her committee assignments due to her past inflammatory statements against Democrats, she is going to be one of the most prominent faces of the new GOP majority. It shows a lot about her position that she can make offensive and insurrectionist comments without being reprimanded from her party’s leader. And it also shows that while Trump’s power may be waning elsewhere after a lackluster launch of his 2024 campaign, his influence over his followers in the House, like Greene, remains strong.

A small group of GOP senators has been calling for a delay in their leadership elections so that they can have a family discussion about why the GOP didn’t perform well. McConnell is vying for GOP leader, and at least one Republican has promised to oppose him.

McConnell has been calling his colleagues over the last several days to shore up his support as his team plans to plow forward with leadership elections on Wednesday. They are planning to have a GOP air-clearing session on Tuesday.

Several members of the Freedom Caucus met with McCarthy in his office Monday as they seek to extract concessions from him in exchange for their speaker votes.

Scott Perry, a Pennsylvania Republican, said that McCarthy would not be able to get the 218 votes he needs until after Tuesday, when he believes someone will challenge McCarthy to show he does not have the support he needs.

Bob Good, who said McCarthy faces a uphill climb to the speakership, said they have asked McCarthy to bring them his proposal for running the House.

When the Party of 2021 Breaks, It’s All You Need (and How You’re Going to Need It,” he Rejoinds

The main focus of the group has been seeking rules changes that would enable individual members, and weaken the speaker, but that isn’t the limit to their issues.

“We want to see this place change dramatically, to reflect the will of the people and to acknowledge how broken it is,” he said. It is incumbent on anybody that wants to lead to put together a vision and explain how they would change their portion of it.

But hard-right Republicans seized the opportunity to extract promises — and in some cases apologies — from their would-be leaders. Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene commented that she would support Mr. McCarthy and questioned whether he would investigate Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida asked Mr. Scalise about comments he made on a private conference call days after the Jan. 6, 2021 riot, in which he agreed with Mr. McCarthy that Mr. Gaetz’s comments about conservatives he deemed insufficiently loyal to Mr. Trump had been dangerous and “potentially illegal.”

Mr. Scalise apologized and said he should have waited until he had more facts to comment, according to two people familiar with the exchange who described it on the condition of anonymity.

The Republican Party was toiling to find a way forward after disappointing midterm results, but still grappling with the influence of the president, and that was underscored by the turmoil. It came as Mr. Trump himself was in the midst of receiving a torrent of blame for the string of mid-term losses by candidates he had picked.

“It’s going to be a narrow one,” said Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma. It makes it very important that you’ve got someone with great political skills. Somebody that knows every part of this conference.”

McCarthy is not the problem: he doesn’t want to be a speaker despite his underwhelming midterm performance in the House

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is hoping to pass a crucial test on Tuesday in his campaign to become House speaker despite an underwhelming midterm election performance that launched a search among conservatives for a challenger.

Idaho GOP Rep. Mike Simpson said he’ll support McCarthy for leader, noting the GOP gained House seats the last two elections. Simpson said that he had done a good job.

If we do not unify behind Kevin McCarthy, we will allow the Democrats to get some of our Republicans,” said Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

“I’ll resist for just a few more hours what I’ve resisted for a few weeks, which is to comment on specific candidates,” Good said. “Kevin McCarthy is part of the problem.”

McCarthy has made public promises about how he would rule over the House, such as threatening to launch an impeachment inquiry into Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and vowing to not take up bills from any GOP senators who backed the massive year-end spending package – both top priorities of the right.

According to two sources familiar with the conversation, McCarthy’s allies have been trying to convince moderate Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar to switch parties so that they could get more votes. The idea was flatly rejected. McCarthys spokesman said that if these conversations took place, the GOP leader was not involved and that this is not in any way part of their strategy for the majority or for his speakership bid.

A source in the room said that a congressman was pressed on his vote in favor of a bill to codify same-sex marriage. His response: “These divisive social issues shouldn’t be brought to the House floor.”

If the fight goes to many ballots on the floor, McCarthy has no plans to give up his speakership ambitions – even if he doesn’t get the majority.

“People want to get to work and this has just been holding us up,” Rep. David Joyce of Ohio, a leader of the Republican Governance Group, told CNN, of the protracted speaker’s fight. There are people who say they don’t care if it is 500 times, but they are voting for Kevin. There is no one else.

“I think Steve Scalise is going to have some problems,” one GOP member told CNN on Monday, adding: “If Kevin McCarthy doesn’t become speaker, then Steve Scalise has faint fingerprints on the dagger.”

Others privately fault Scalise for not being more forceful in his support for McCarthy or insisting he would stick with the California Republican no matter how long it takes. Some Republican members believe that will hurt the congressman if he attempts to become speaker.

Rep. Jim Jordan, the conservative set to become the chair of the House Judiciary Committee, went even further, ruling out jumping into the race even though Gaetz and other hardliners have urged him to seek the speakership.

The South Carolina Republican said he will vote for Andy for speaker, if there is something to be discussed. He later added: “All this is positive. Regardless of what happens, we are having good change. You will see more of it.

The five ‘hard no’ votes who were part of the secret ballot voted to come out against McCarthy in their public statements. And after negotiations earlier last month dragged on, an additional group formalized their demands to McCarthy in a letter – further upping pressure on the Republican leader to cut a deal.

McCarthy has already begun brokering some rules changes to empower rank-and-file members, created a new select committee on China, vowed to boot some Democratic lawmakers from their committees, and sketched out in greater detail his investigative plans – including a potential impeachment inquiry into Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.

McCarthy also agreed to to change a rule that would allow a group of five members to offer a resolution to remove the speaker. He insisted for weeks he wouldn’t agree to lower the threshold on how many sponsors are needed on a “motion to vacate the chair” because it effectively weakens the power of the speaker. McCarthy’s small margin and the fact that he cannot afford more than a few defections led to the pressure from the right.

McCarthy has been adamantly opposed to restoring the “motion to vacate the chair,” and a majority of the House GOP voted against the idea during a during a closed-door meeting last month. When asked by CNN on Thursday if he would visit the issue, McCarthy laughed and refused to answer.

The impact of a January is believed to be one of the reasons for not seeing a red wave. I know that whenever I go in my district, I want you guys to get things done.

That there is even a question over whether the words of the supposedly most powerful Republican-to-be in Washington or a renegade member carry more currency reflects McCarthy’s diminished authority – and highlights the risk that if he does have a speakership, it could be a weak one.

Electing the Next Speaker: A New Perspective on White House Republicans and Caucus Politics in the Era of Super-Republican Dialogue

Some Democrats have said they would entertain the idea, including Rep. Henry Cuellar, a moderate Democrat from Texas who told CNN some of his GOP colleagues have approached him “informally” about it.

Joyce also said some members have reached out to him about potentially running, but he dismissed it. “At the end of the day, Kevin’s going to be the new speaker.”

New York Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, the next House Democratic leader, said, “there are no behind-the-scenes conversations” that he has had with Republicans to put up an alternative candidate. But he refused to rule out a scenario where his caucus would help elect the next speaker if McCarthy couldn’t get the votes.

“Democrats are in the process of organizing the Democratic Conference,” Jeffries told CNN on Thursday. The Republicans are working on organizing the conference. Let’s see what happens on January 3.”

Some of the potential consensus picks that have been floated included retiring Reps. Fred Upton of Michigan and John Katko of New York, who both voted to impeach Donald Trump for inciting the Capitol insurrection; Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, co-chair of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus; and Oklahoma Rep. Tom Cole, a veteran lawmaker and incoming head of the House Rules Committee.

But that would require agreement from every single Democrat and the help of five Republicans – no easy feat. Upton said he has no plans to be in Washington that day, telling CNN: “I’ll be skiing.”

Westerman said that it happened before in his state of Arkansas where minority Democrats in the legislature joined forces with a group of Republicans toelect a GOP speaker. Westerman made the case to his colleagues at a closed-door meeting.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/09/politics/mccarthy-speaker-house-republicans-218/index.html

Westerman’s campaign for change and reform: urging lawmakers to drop the lame-duck spending bill to fund the government, the Republican National Committee chairman, and the California senator

“I’m concerned about January 3 getting here and us not being able to form a Congress and organize committees and getting delayed in pushing the policy objectives that we want to push,” Westerman said.

Changing House rules is a good subject for discussion, according to Westerman. He did not seem excited about any destructive movement.

If Mr. McCarthy did have a plan he has not shared it with his leadership team, who believe it to be a display of paranoia. Instead, he has been spotted in recent days around the Capitol and the Republican National Committee headquarters nearby with Jeff Miller, a Republican lobbyist who is among his closest confidants.

Mr. Norman, who has described himself as a “hard no” against Mr. McCarthy, declined to discuss his call with Mr. Trump, describing it as a “private conversation.” He wasn’t sure who he would support for speaker. Mr. Crane did not respond to requests for comment.

When Nancy Pelosi in 2018 found herself about a dozen votes short of what she would need to secure the speaker’s gavel, she quietly picked off defectors, methodically cutting deals to capture exactly enough support to prevail. Ms. Pelosi, renowned for her ability to arm-twist and coax, won seven votes by agreeing to limit her tenure, picked up another eight by promising to implement rules aimed at fostering more bipartisan legislating, and won over her sole would-be challenger by creating a subcommittee chairmanship for her.

The California Republican has already made a series of pledges in an effort to appease the right flank of his party. He traveled to the southern border and made a request for Alejandro N. Mayorkas to resign or face impeachment proceedings. He promised the woman that was stripped of her committee assignments for making violent and conspiratorial posts before she was elected, a plum spot on the Oversight Committee.

He said he would hold public hearings about the security failures that caused the attack at the Capitol. He has met with ultraconservative lawmakers in an effort to win them over. And on Monday night, he publicly encouraged his members to vote against the lame-duck spending bill to fund the government.

The Case for a Bipartisan Framework for the January 6 Congressional Analogy of the Los Angeles-based Mob-Rotor Attack

The GOP taking over the House of Representatives in January would mean a shaky governing mandate for any party in American history. And the ideological struggle being waged by pro-Donald Trump extremists inside the party would have made even a more comfortable majority volatile.

The moderates on Sunday’s call said they would only swallow the concession if McCarthy votes for it. During Sunday’s call, they voiced their concern that some of the hardliners were not negotiating in good faith and that they wouldn’t come through.

The California Republican is in a fight against members who want to make it easier to remove a speaker, and also against those who are trying to get ex- President Donald Trump to join their cause.

McCarthy has abandoned principle before in the pursuit of power. The most glaring example was his flip-flop on Trump’s culpability over the January 6 attack on the US Capitol. McCarthy initially took to the House floor proclaiming about Trump: “The President bears responsibility for Wednesday’s attack on Congress by mob rioters.” McCarthy added, “He should have immediately denounced the mob when he saw what was unfolding.”

It’s so critical that we get a bipartisan framework agreement in time for the year-end deadline, since it could easily be used to dump a fiscal crisis onto the lap of a weak and easily manipulated new government.

The Next-to-Minimal Candidate: Putting the House Republican Agenda on the Warpath and Preventing it From Scattering

The possible future speaker was asked about the latest comments from Greene and shrugged them all off: she said she was being facetious. His attitude was not a surprise; it was consistent with his attempts to rewrite the history of the worst attack on US democracy in modern times, for which he briefly said Trump bore responsibility.

The same dynamic was at play when McCarthy declined to directly criticize the ex-president for meeting with white supremacist Nick Fuentes at a dinner also featuring Kanye West, the rapper now known as Ye, who has recently made a string of antisemitic remarks. The House Republican leader made a big deal of it at the White House when he said that Trump had condemned Fuentes four times when he hadn’t done so before.

McCarthy threatened to block bills in the next Congress if senators who voted for the spending package were allowed to do so. He also suggested Republicans are doing McCarthy a favor by passing this year’s spending bill now rather than leave it to next year, when Republicans will take control of the House.

It will be interesting to see what will happen in the future when it comes to tensions between Republicans in the House and McConnell.

McCarthy said that this is a presidential year, and that it’s hard to get out there and govern. “And you want to hit the ground running. If you lose a quarter, you don’t start strong. You don’t get candidates with the strength you need. You don’t have enough resources to give them the resources to spread the word.

McCarthy accused the detractors of putting the entire House Republican agenda in danger, including getting a new select committee on China up and running. McCarthy can only afford to lose four GOP votes on January 3, assuming all members are in attendance and vote for a specific member.

Five GOP members, including Gaetz, are threatening to vote as a bloc on January 3, meaning they will all vote.

“This is a lot of unfinished business this year that they would have to take care of next year and I know from having been over there, that wouldn’t be easy, especially when you’ have a narrow majority.”

We are during the silly season of a campaign. After you are elected, that is over for most of us. He said that it was still apparent from his silliness that he is running for Speaker of the House.

The Dean Obeidallah Show: A Conversation with Kevin Santos about his Admissible Misrepresentations about his Educational and Work Experiences

Editor’s Note: Dean Obeidallah, a former attorney, is the host of SiriusXM radio’s daily program “The Dean Obeidallah Show.” Follow him @[email protected]. The commentary he is authoring is his own. View more opinion on CNN.

Since December 19 The New York Times published an article that documented false claims about his education and work experience. (Santos later described these falsehoods as “resume embellishment” but admitted to misrepresenting his employment and educational background.)

Santos also claimed that his grandparents fled the horrors of the Holocaust as Ukrainian Jewish refugees from Belgium — only to have this version of his family background contradicted by a review of genealogy records. TheSantos campaign did not respond to the request for comment.

Federal and state authorities have started criminal investigations into Santos over his finances and fabrications. When he first ran for Congress unsuccessfully in 2020, Santos reported he had no assets, yet somehow he was able to lend his 2022 campaign $700,000.

Throughout these twists and turns, one thing has remained constant: GOP House leader Kevin McCarthy has not condemned Santos. Not over his admitted falsehoods, his apparent misrepresentation about family members fleeing the Holocaust, questions regarding his campaign funding or even reports on his spending of campaign funds on travel to places such as Miami. (McCarthy has not returned CNN’s requests for comment about Santos.)

McCarthy has also criticized the Biden administration’s border policy and played up accusations on Fox Business that the FBI worked to suppress news stories hurtful to Democrats.

Imagine if an incoming Democratic member of Congress were involved in a scandal. McCarthy would be screaming about how the Democratic leaders needed to condemn this representative-elect and how he should not be in Congress.

Choosing a First Speaker: How Rep. Pelosi and Rep. McConnell Lost Their Support for the Re-elected Speakership

It is not the first time that a new speaker has only received a few votes, and it has happened a number of times for recent speakers. Last Congress, Pelosi was reelected speaker with 216 votes. It was the same for Boehner in 2015. In fact, it appears that five speakers have been elected with less than 218 votes in the last century.

His net positive rating was 30 points, which was found in a CNN/SSRS poll. That is certainly not bad. McConnell has low ratings among Republicans. A net favorability rating of 30 points isn’t very good.

McCarthy has the second-lowest net favorability rating among his own party members of all first-time potential speakers in the last 28 years. Gingrich had a + 24 points in 1994. In late 2010) and late 2006 there were net favorability ratings above + 50 points among the party faithful.

After losing the House majority, Democrats get all of the GOP angst. If nothing else, they’re watching a Republican Party that can’t seem to get its act together after a historically bad midterm for an opposition party.

Four days before the House speaker vote, when his critics were still noncommittal about their support for his speakership bid, even after the California Republican had offered a number of key concessions – including making it easier to oust the sitting speaker – he attempted to give them the hard sell.

But now with just one day to go, a group of at least nine Republicans have made clear that they’re still not sold – despite McCarthy’s warning and even after he gave in to some of their most ardent demands, which he outlined during a Sunday evening conference call.

We are ready for a fight, to be honest. Not the way we want to start out in our new majority, but you can’t really negotiate against the position of ‘give us everything we ask for and we won’t guarantee anything in return,’” Rep. Kelly Armstrong of North Dakota, a member of the centrist-leaning Republican Governance Group, told CNN.

I give him a lot of credit. He’s brought everyone in and worked really hard to figure out a way forward. This place can be made run better. But I get the feeling that not everyone is negotiating in good faith.”

McCarthy worked the phones with critics and supporters to find consensus on rules changes to win over holdouts.

Jeremy McCarthy, the House Speaker, hasn’t yet broken a promise or two: a collective cry of frustration and discontent

Since he can only lose four votes on the House floor, at least five Republicans have promised to oppose him, with nearly a dozen other GOP lawmakers saying they are still not there yet.

Lawmakers worked over the weekend to finalize the rules package. Ultimately, McCarthy informed Republicans on the conference-wide call Sunday evening that he agreed to the five-person threshold on the motion to vacate – which he billed as a “compromise.”

McCarthy released the final rules package later that evening and also put out a “Dear Colleague” letter making one last pitch for the job, which included additional promises about how he’d govern as speaker – including ensuring that the GOP’s ideological groups are better represented on committees.

That group is still pushing for a single member to be able to call for a vote toppling the speaker, which is what it used to be before Speaker Nancy Pelosi changed the rules, and they also want a commitment that leadership won’t play in primaries.

“Thus far, there continue to be missing specific commitments with respect to virtually every component of our entreaties, and thus, no means to measure whether promises are kept or broken,” the letter, obtained by CNN, states.

In another strategic move, McCarthy postponed races for any contested committee chairs until after the speaker vote. He said it was to allow freshman members to have input in the process, but other members believe it was a way to insulate himself from potential criticism from members who end up losing their races.

In phone calls and text messages during the holidays, McCarthy’s defenders vowed to him and each other they wouldn’t let a handful of members control their conference.

McCarthy’s opposition, however, has also been working in tandem – and they are far more practiced in playing hardball, though the Freedom Caucus has been openly divided over McCarthy.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/02/politics/kevin-mccarthy-house-speaker-struggle/index.html

The fight over McCarthy’s next speaker: practical implications and trapping staffers in parliamentary committees: a memo by the committee in charge of administrative matters

The committee in charge of administrative matters sent a letter last week outlining the practical implications and pitfalls of a drawn-out speaker’s fight. Without an approved House Rules package, the memo outlined that committees won’t be able to pay staff.

The same memo, which was first reported by Politico and obtained by CNN, also warned that student loan payments for committee staff wouldn’t be disbursed if a rules package isn’t adopted by mid-January.

The House and the Republican majority can be paralyzed by a battle over the next speaker with rank-and-file staffers hit with harsher penalties than if they had already been in office.

Even though the race was far from over, boxes from McCarthy’s office were spotted by CNN being moved into the speaker’s suite to show he’s committed to seeking the job.

“It is a bizarre game of chicken where both sides have ripped the steering wheel off the dashboard and are just going pedal to the metal,” one member said of the ongoing standoff between pro- and anti-McCarthy factions.

It is not certain if Republicans can get the 218 votes needed to win the speakership, and a floor fight is possible that could hurt their ability to govern.

Don said that Steve was trying to be very supportive. “He has been public that he is supporting McCarthy. I think someday he wants to be speaker so he’s got to be tactful.”

He told CNN that their focus was to get it resolved by January 3. “And there’s a lot of conversations that everybody has been having, Kevin, surely, with the members who have expressed concerns.”

A source on the call said that in the private meeting on Sunday, House Majority leader scruise embraced his role as incoming majority leader by laying out the agenda and the bills that would come to the floor this week.

The hardliners would like to reduce the threshold to just a single member who can call for the vote, something that many House Republicans fear would cause chaos.

One GOP member said that if McCarthy’s KMC didn’t get votes, people would be more against rule and operational changes.

If McCarthy can’t win 218 votes, the hard-liners have suggested a new candidate would emerge but they have steadfastly refused to name the individual – something that is infuriating many McCarthy allies in the conference.

Good promised a new candidate would emerge on Tuesday, and they wouldn’t be in a hurry to make a bad decision. He didn’t specify the member and refused to say anything about Scalise.

Rep. Dusty Johnson, a South Dakota Republican, said that he found it “incredible” that the same members pushing for a more “open and transparent” GOP conference are getting behind a “shadow candidate” they plan to “ambush” Republicans with at the start of the new Congress.

“I think members are growing increasingly frustrated with the intransigence of some of the holdouts,” Johnson told CNN, calling some of them “chaos agents who are trying to cause trouble.”

“Folks should not believe this is some noble cause,” said one GOP lawmaker. “No one should believe that this is anything other than self aggrandizement. They are trying to push procedures that don’t matter outside of Washington in order to gain more power.

Rep. Markwayne Mullin: “The times call for a radical departure of the status quo,” Republican Rep. Scott Perry tweeted

Sen.-elect Markwayne Mullin, an Oklahoma Republican and outgoing House member, met with McCarthy in his office on Monday. Mullin said that he and others have urged McCarthy to stay put.

Pennsylvania GOP Rep. Scott Perry, a leading McCarthy critic who signed onto a letter with nine other Republicans circulated on New Year’s day, tweeted: “nothing changes when nothing changes.” He cited the letter, which states “the times call for a radical departure of the status quo — not a continuation of the past, and ongoing Republican failures.”

But nothing else can happen in the House of Representatives until a speaker is elected. It’s the only leadership position mentioned in the Constitution.