By Eric Mack, NEWSMAX 07 January 2023
Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) bangs the Speaker’s gavel for the first time after being elected the next Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives in a late night 15th round of voting on the fourth day of the 118th Congress at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, U.S., January 7, 2023. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein[/caption]
Former President Donald Trump was derided for having some of his staunch supporters holding out against House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., but Trump’s dramatic call to House chamber to Reps. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., and Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., is credited for closing the deal.
“Thank you Kevin,” Trump posted Saturday morning to Truth Social, along with video of the newly tapped speaker hailing Trump’s late-night call. “It was my great honor!”
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., an advocate for the rights of the imprisoned Jan. 6 defendants, tweeted photos of the calls from Trump to the six holdouts standing firm against McCarthy through the 14th failed vote.
“I do want to especially thank President Trump,” McCarthy, once a critic of Trump from Jan. 6, 2021, told reporters after his speaker acceptance speech and the swearing-in of members. “I don’t think anybody should doubt his influence. He was with me from the beginning. Somebody wrote the doubt of whether he was there. And he was all in. He would call me and he would call others.
“He really was — and I was just talking to him tonight — helping get those final votes.”
Trump’s calls to the six holdouts against McCarthy came as Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Ala., had to be restrained by Rep. Richard Hudson, R-N.C., when shouting down Gaetz for continuing to hold out, forcing a potential vote to adjourn until Monday and, ultimately, a 15th vote that proved to be successful.
As tempers cooled, within the hour, McCarthy and Trump had persuaded the holdouts to vote “present,” lowering the vote total necessary for McCarthy to win and handing him the speakership by early Saturday morning.
“I hope one thing is clear,” McCarthy said when he finally took the gavel after 1 a.m. ET. “I never give up.”
The chaos on the House floor came exactly two years after the Jan. 6, 2021 storming of the Capitol. During a late-night session after that attack, McCarthy called it the “saddest day I’ve ever had” as a member of Congress. In the days afterward, McCarthy blamed Trump for encouraging his supporters, who attacked the building and interrupted the certification of President Joe Biden.
But just a few weeks later, McCarthy traveled to see Trump in Florida and made amends.
While many lawmakers denounced Trump at the time, McCarthy’s Florida visit brought him back into the fold; and the former president was working the phones Friday evening, calling Gaetz and the other holdouts.
“What he’s really saying, for the party and the country, that we have to come together,” McCarthy told reporters after taking the speaker’s gavel from Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.
“We have to focus on the economy and we have to focus to make our border secure. We’ve got so much work to do, and he was a great influence to make that all happen.
“So, thank you, President Trump.”
<
>
<
>
<
>
Thanks Peloni. Yes I knew about the changes but I fear in practice they are all United on War, and they are lunatic.
@Felix
I don’t think you actually appreciate what has been achieved by Trump/MAGA as they improved the limited hand which had been dealt to them in this last election.
Trump/MAGA did not have the votes to pick the Speaker. This was due in part to McCarthy pulling the funding from many of the MAGA candidates, both in the primaries and the general election (it was also due in part to election fraud, but let’s not digress). The consequence of this betrayal of the Republican party by the Republican House Leader was that the MAGA members represent about 20% (at most) of the Reps and nowhere remotely close to the 218 members needed to choose the Speaker. Of these MAGA members, only 20 were even bold enough to enact the plan to improve their position to control the House of Representatives despite their tawdry numbers.
Due to McCarthy’s manipulation of the election against the MAGA candidates, the Republicans had too few members to ignore the demands of the 20 MAGA holdouts while choosing the Speaker. Stated differently, the Republican Neocons needed the MAGA members to support their choice of speaker, regardless of who it might be. The twenty holdouts, reportedly under Trump’s direction, held out against a great deal of pressure applied against them, including from even within the MAGA base itself.
Trump/MAGA had a choice. They could have chosen to force McCarthy out and replace him with a compromise candidate over whom they would have had no control in dictating the rules of the House, or they could keep McCarthy and remake the rules of the House such that the House would function with an undue influence from the MAGA members. They chose substance over optics. Of course, it would have been quite pleasing to have seen the fall of McCarthy as retribution for his betrayal of his own party members – let alone all the other motivations, not the least of which includes his role in characterizing Jan 6 as an insurrection by MAGA – but this would have been a point of grandstanding as it would have only resulted in some other Neocon member taking power, leaving the Business-As-Usual Uniparty in power for another two years. Under the agreed to changes in the Rules governing the House, McCarthy has ceded a great deal of control to the MAGA members.
Here is a good explanation of many of the changes achieved by Trump and his MAGA representatives in McCarthy’s compromises:
McCarthy’s Concessions To Freedom Caucus And What They Mean
The Neocons are not eliminated from power, as MAGA had not the votes to achieve this goal, but they are constrained from doing exactly as they please without any accountability or consequence. Despite what any of us wanted, this was an enormous victory for representative govt, and a serious blow to the Neocon establishment – which is why it took 15 votes before they agreed to the changes.
Of course, now they have to actually pass the changes to the Rules which have been agreed upon, so we will see how that goes.
@BPoster
Trump who you call the team player always ends up serving the interests of US Imperialism. He has done so here in helping to have McCarthy elected as speaker. And this is the two faced person who most all on Israpundit seems to support. Shows that Trump always works for Imperialism and it’s wars . McCarthy is surely part of the Neocons and with Trump and Biden now joined explicitly the danger of world nuclear conflagration increases. I expected this from Trump.
Kevin,
Millions of people across America and the world are injured or dead from a Covid with delisted safe early treatment options and forced injections into bloodstreams, neither safe nor effective.
The border, the debt, the woke bs don’t matter a hoot when the law making house you lead has stolen health, and freedom, and human rights and dignity.
Nothing Else Matters
This doesn’t surprise me. Whether one loves or hates former president Trump he is the ultimate team player always putting the interests of the team ahead of his own. There aren’t many like him. The persecution of this great man, his associates, and his family really must end.