After losing 14 consecutive votes over the course of four mortifying days, California Rep. Kevin McCarthy was elected speaker of the House early Saturday.
Twenty of McCarthy’s fellow Republicans—members of the hardline Freedom Caucus—had held out for a range of concessions from the incoming speaker. They included requests for some interesting aberrations from the norm, and also plenty of nonsense.
Before the votes even began on Tuesday, which was supposed to be the first day of Congress, McCarthy had already agreed to a package of rules changes that addressed some pet concerns of the ultraconservative bloc, including a provision that would let any group of five members force a vote on ousting the speaker at any time.
By the end of the ordeal, he had caved much further: In a late-Wednesday meeting that ran into Thursday morning, McCarthy agreed to give the Freedom Caucus multiple seats on the powerful Rules Committee (which influences how legislation makes it to the floor), hold a vote on term limits for members, and allow any single member to trigger a vote to overthrow the speaker. Also, a McCarthy-aligned super PAC agreed to, essentially, a noncompete with the more hardline super PAC Club for Growth when it comes to spending in safe Republican districts for future elections. That earned McCarthy the club’s endorsement for speaker. Even after all of that, the rebel group refused to budge.
It was a messy week. To get the 218 votes he needed for a simple majority, McCarthy could spare only four votes from his party—so while 200 or more Republicans voted for McCarthy in each round, the holdouts retained the power to make extreme demands. And as more and more holdouts folded, the remaining holdouts got more extreme. At one point, Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz started nominating “Donald John Trump.” (No rule requires the speaker to be a member of Congress, but—come on!)
The process took one final twist on Friday night. On the 14th ballot, when McCarthy thought he would win, he fell one vote short—and confronted Gaetz from the center aisle of the House. After patching things up, McCarthy won on the next vote.
Establishment Republicans are not pleased that the anti-McCarthy faction was rewarded for its noncooperation after putting the GOP through a humiliating spectacle. Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina called it a “hostage situation” and accused the Freedom Caucus members of being “un-American,” motivated by their egos and fundraising targets. Rep. Dan Crenshaw said “these fucking people” were “being clowns.” Rep. Don Bacon scoffed at the group’s demand for plum committee assignments: “We’re not going to do affirmative action for the smallest caucus we have.”
More concerned with extracting concessions than mounting a convincing opposition campaign, the Freedom Caucus members never rallied around a single alternative to McCarthy. They cast votes for a slew of Republican members of Congress: Andy Biggs, Byron Donalds, Jim Jordan (whose support for McCarthy never wavered), and eventually, putting the lie to their “Never Kevin” moniker, Kevin Hern. Rep. Victoria Spartz started out voting for McCarthy, then began voting “present” in the fourth round.
In the end, the requisite number fell in line and received pats on the head for their obedience, and McCarthy got his precious office. Now we get to watch these people try to govern.
