House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), 58, faces the fight for his speakernship, after 41-year-old Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fl.), a close ally of former President Donald Trump, filed a motion to vacate. Gaetz has been gunning for McCarthy since he worked with Democrats Sept. 30 to defeat a government shutdown, something that stopped Gaetz and other members of the conservative Freedom Caucus from getting their way. Gaetz wanted a government shutdown to push for real budget negotiations, not the 45-day delay offered by the continuing resolution [CR]. Trump and Freedom Caucus conservatives want real negotiations with the White House and House Democrats to reduce the 2023 $1.6 trillion budget deficit and $33 trillion national debt, something playing havoc in financial markets. McCarthy worked with Democrats to get the CR, infuriating Gaetz and the Freedom Caucus.
McCarthy finds himself at the mercy of the same Democrats he worked to complete the CR and stop a government shutdown. House Minority Leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), 53, urged his Democrat colleagues to not save McCarthy, telling them it’s a GOP problem, not up to Democrats to settle the crisis. Yet when it came to the Freedom Caucus trying to shut down the government, McCarthy worked across the aisle to prevent the shutdown. So, when it comes to Jeffries playing politics, it works both ways. There’s no benefit to Democrats letting Republicans get rid of McCarthy and pick a new House Speaker. Jeffries listened to Democrat analysts heading into an election year, wanting to create a much chaos as possible for Republicans. But Jeffries can’t tell Democrats what to do or how to vote when it comes to the motion to table Gaetz’s attempt to vacate the speakership.
McCarthy needs 218 votes, a simple majority of the 435 total House votes. Most Republicans support McCarthy, needing only a handful of Democrats to continue his job as speaker. Most Democrat dislike Gaetz, realizing that with so many problems facing the House, they need continuity to get a new budget before the Nov. 17 deadline. Gaetz and the Freedom Caucus oppose Ukraine funding, something backed by a majority of House Democrats and Republicans. Only Trump and the Freedom Caucus don’t support Ukraine funding, largely because they see Biden’s proxy war against the Kremlin an abysmal failure. Trump vowed, if elected president, to end the conflict in 24 hours-or-less, something rejected by Ukraine’s 45-year-old President Volodymyr Zelensky. Biden committed to the war when he said March 26, 2022 that 70-year-old Russian President Vladimir Putin should not lead Russia.
Democrats have the power to table Gaetz’s motion to vacate or should that pass, to defeat the motion to vacate. McCarthy only needs six Democrats of 213 to save his job. When you consider McCarthy stopped the government shutdown, you’d think at least a handful of Democrats would either abstain from voting or vote to keep his speakership. Why Gaetz has a vendetta with McCarthy is anyone’s guess. But it may have to do with possible criminal charge against Gaetz last year for sex trafficking. No one knows for sure Gaetz’s vendetta but its disrupting House’s work at a time of great economic and political peril for both parties. Gaetz thinks, without proof, that McCarthy cut a deal with Biden to fund the Ukraine War, but more importantly, to work on both sides of the aisle. Conservative Republicans gave McCarthy fits in January, taking 15 ballots to elect him speaker.
McCarthy has a good chance of tabling the motion to vacate with only a small number of Democrats needs to save his job. Democrats know that they’ve worked with McCarthy to defeat the government shutdown and they can work with him to compromise on the 2024 federal budget. However many cuts Gaetz and the Freedom Caucus demand, Democrats know they can count on McCarthy to keep the budget relatively intact. Should the vote to table the motion to vacate fail, Democrats will have to do a lot of soul searching to let McCarthy lose his speakership. Jeffries thinks it’s not Democrats job to save McCarthy. But it is Democrats job to vote their conscience not vote politically to oust McCarthy. Whoever Republicans pick as their next speaker, they could be far more conservative than McCarthy. Jeffries doesn’t like that McCarthy allowed an impeachment inquiry to go forward.
Democrats and Republicans have a lot a stake watching Wall Street swoon with the chaos happening on Capitol Hill. Tossing McCarthy out opens the floodgates for Republicans to pick a news speaker, someone more acceptable to the Freedom Caucus. If Gaetz wins in his motion to vacate, he will play kingmaker in picking the next speaker or leaving the GOP in chaos heading into the 2024 election. McCarthy isn’t likely to survive the vote because Jeffries instructed his Democrat caucus to vote against the speaker for backing Biden’s impeachment inquiry. McCarthy finds himself in a political vice, damned if he does, damned if he doesn’t. If a handful of Democrats don’t take mercy on McCarthy he’ll be out as House Speaker. It’s doubtful McCarthy could try again to run for speaker, giving Republicans a chance to find a consensus pick, someone acceptable to the entire GOP.
About the Author
John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
