Will this time be chosen? Member of the House of Representatives Kevin McCarthy (Photo: Shirley Preston/Shutterstock)
The political crisis in the US Congress has entered its third day, with Republican lawmaker Kevin McCarthy now trying to reach agreements with members of his party to get their support for his nomination as Speaker of the House of Representatives. The reports of the negotiations come after McCarthy failed to get a majority for his nomination in – 6 consecutive votes held in the last two days.
According to the report in the Washington Post, during the night McCarthy presented a new proposal to the 20 rebel Republicans who refused to vote for him, with the aim of pleasing them for the seventh vote. Sources privy to the details of the conversation said that McCarthy agreed to assign members of the “Freedom Faction” additional places on the Constitution Committee of the House of Representatives, and also pledged to advance additional bills on immigration and border management.
At this stage it is not yet clear whether the rebel Republicans, who are identified with the extreme right faction of the party, will agree to McCarthy’s proposal and support him in the next votes. At the same time, some of the more moderate Republicans expressed discomfort with the published proposal, and were outraged that the rebels are holding Congress as a political hostage – so it is possible that even if the rebels agree, McCarthy will lose votes from the rest of the faction and be left without a majority again this time.
As mentioned, McCarthy has so far failed in his attempt to be elected Speaker of the House of Representatives, after all 6 votes on his appointment so far ended without a majority for any candidate. This is the first time in a century that a Speaker of the Lower House of Congress was not elected on the first ballot. As a result, the House of Representatives is paralyzed and unable to function until a chairman is elected who will win a majority.
The first vote was held last Tuesday, when 212 Democratic Party representatives voted for their candidate, Hakeem Jeffries – while only 203 of the 222 Republican representatives voted for McCarthy, and 19 lawmakers voted for another candidate. Although Democrat Jeffries received the most votes, the vote ended in a tie because a majority of 218 of the 435 members of the House of Representatives is required to be appointed speaker.
During the debate on the second vote, Jim Jordan, the Republican candidate who received the votes of the 19 rebels in the first round, called on them not to vote for him and to support McCarthy – but they voted instead for Byron Donalds, and the vote ended with the same result. In the subsequent third round, another Republican lawmaker changed his vote and joined the rebels, and as a result it was decided to close the debate. Last night, 3 more votes were held, which ended with the same result and without a majority for any candidate.
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