What you need to know
- The House of Representatives adjourned until Wednesday without electing a speaker after Republicans failed to unite behind a candidate.
- It's the first time in more than a century that the House has failed to elect a new speaker on the first ballot — forcing the chamber to hold multiple votes.
- Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California received support from an overwhelming majority of Republicans in three rounds of votes but was still short of the 218 needed to win a simple majority of the 434 House members present.
- Opposition to McCarthy has been fueled by his right flank, who have coalesced to cast their votes for Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, even though he continues to back McCarthy.
- Democrats have remained united, casting all of their votes for Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York.
Speaker standoff highlights deep GOP divisions
A stunning inability to elect a speaker Tuesday highlighted fissures within the Republican Party over strategy and vision, grinding the House to a halt and raising fresh questions about the future of the GOP.
“We have to make a choice today: Are we going to be the party of the radical 2%? Because that’s what it comes down to,” a frustrated Rep. Kat Cammack, R-Fla., said after a caucus meeting. “Kevin McCarthy will be the speaker of the House — and I don’t care if it’s the first ballot or the 97th ballot.”
The standoff was demoralizing for a party that had hoped to use the new majority to show Americans how it would govern — before it asks voters to give the GOP control of the White House and the Senate in the 2024 elections. Instead, the displays of dysfunction threaten to further alienate independent and center-right voters, who drifted toward Democrats in 2022, causing the GOP’s underperformance in the midterm elections and its current paper-thin margin.
“I think it’s a problem for the party. It absolutely is,” said former Rep. Mick Mulvaney, R-S.C., a co-founder of the House Freedom Caucus, home to the rebels. “How is it not a problem for the party if we can’t even decide on who our leader’s going to be?”
Stacks of pizza make their way to McCarthy's office
A stack of pizza boxes was seen Tuesday evening being carted to the speaker's office — where McCarthy moved in earlier in the day before he was thrice denied the speaker’s job in votes on the House floor.
After the pizza arrived, another staffer was seen carrying in a bag of food from Chick-fil-A.
A crowd of reporters waited outside the door, where they have seen staff members come and go but, so far, no other lawmakers.
Children slumber while stuck in House during speaker vote
Lawmakers often bring their children to the first day of the new Congress, allowing them to join them on the floor during their swearing-in ceremonies. But this year, the unresolved speaker's vote meant many were stuck with their parents for hours.
Newly elected Democrat plans to take oath on Superman comic book
Rep.-elect Robert Garcia, D-Calif., whose swearing in to Congress was delayed Tuesday by the deadlocked House speaker vote, tweeted about a collection of memorabilia that he wanted to take his oath on, including a comic book.
Garcia, who is gay, came to the U.S. from Peru as a child. He became the first LGBTQ immigrant elected to Congress in November.
Marjorie Taylor Greene chastises Republicans who opposed McCarthy
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia chastised fellow Republicans who opposed McCarthy for speaker, noting that Jordan is supporting McCarthy and has said he wants to be chair of the Judiciary Committee.
"How did 19 Republicans not respect that?" Greene asked reporters after the House adjourned. Nineteen Republicans voted for Jordan on the second ballot, and 20 backed him in the third vote.
"I think 19, or 20 now, should respect Jim Jordan's wishes," Greene said of the conservatives who voted for Jordan instead of McCarthy.
She also pointed out that Jordan had boosted McCarthy's candidacy “over and over” by nominating him for speaker and voting in his favor.
Jordan says he is 'focused on' becoming committee chair
Jordan, who emerged Tuesday as McCarthy's top GOP contender for speaker even though he's backing McCarthy, said he's focusing his efforts on becoming the next chair of the Judiciary Committee.
"I like this ability to cross-examine witnesses and get the get the truth for the country. So that's what I'm focused on," he told reporters after the third ballot failed to produce a speaker.
Asked whether there was any chance he would be speaker, Jordan said, “No.”
Jordan was the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee in the previous Congress. In the third vote for speaker on Tuesday, 20 conservative Republicans voted for him. McCarthy, meanwhile, won 202 votes, falling short of the 218 needed to win.
Exclusive: Trump mum on whether he still supports McCarthy for speaker
Former President Donald Trump, who'd endorsed Rep. Kevin McCarthy's bid for House speaker, declined to say Tuesday whether he still supports his longtime ally after he failed to clinch the job in three separate votes.
"We’ll see what happens,” Trump said when asked directly whether he was sticking with McCarthy, the GOP leader, in a brief phone conversation.
“I got everybody calling me wanting my support. But let’s see what happens and we’ll go — I got everybody calling, wanting my support,” he said. “That’s all I can say. But we’ll see what happens. We’ll see how it all works out.”
Trump had repeatedly backed McCarthy and urged his allies in the ultraconservative Freedom Caucus to back him, as well, telling Breitbart in an interview last month: “I’m friendly with a lot of those people who are against Kevin. I think almost every one of them are very much inclined toward Trump, and me toward them. But I have to tell them, and I have told them, you’re playing a very dangerous game. You could end up with the worse situation."
Trump's distancing himself from McCarthy could prove fatal to his already imperiled bid for speaker. The House is expected to reconvene Wednesday.
House adjourns without speaker until Wednesday at noon
After the third vote failed to produce a speaker, Republican Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma moved to adjourn, sending the House out until noon Wednesday.
The motion was approved by a voice vote.
A chaotic speaker's race also took place Tuesday in Pennsylvania
As Congress convened Tuesday, unsure exactly who would become the next speaker of the House, legislators in Pennsylvania's statehouse faced a similar predicament.
Although Democrats won a narrow majority in the state House in November, for the first time in a decade, the balance of power was up in the air because one of the victorious lawmakers was dead — Anthony DeLuca, 85, died too close to the election to be replaced on the ballot — and two other Democrats resigned after being elected to higher office.
According to The Philadelphia Inquirer, Republicans walked into the speaker's vote Tuesday with a 101-99 edge. Yet in a surprise result, a Democrat, Mark Rozzi, ended up winning the top job. Democrats and a handful of Republicans joined to elect Rozzi, who was not a top contender for speaker. Many Democrats backed Rep. Joanna McClinton from Philadelphia, hoping to make her the first woman to hold the position. But it became clear that neither party would get the votes for their top picks.
The Associated Press reported that Rozzi was nominated by conservative Republicans from the western part of the state. After he won, Rozzi said he would no longer caucus with Democrats and would instead become Pennsylvania's first independent speaker.
