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Speaker fiasco lays bare ungovernable dysfunction of House Republicans

One branch of US government has ground to a halt amid death threats and screaming matches as Republicans fail to unite around a candidate for
speaker
David Smith
David Smith in Washington
@smithinamerica
Sat 21 Oct 2023 14.00 BST
Last modified on Sat 21 Oct 2023 14.50 BST

Death threats. Screaming matches behind closed doors. A futile cycle of
votes that put internecine warfare on full public display. The Republican
party this week sank into new depths of disarray and dysfunction – with no remedy in sight.

Never before has America gone so long without a speaker of the House of Representatives and, critics say, not for a very long time has a major
party appeared so broken. It has left a branch of the US government
leaderless at an extraordinary moment of peril in the Middle East and
Ukraine.
Jim Jordan at the US Capitol on 20 October.
Why do Republicans oppose Jim Jordan as speaker and what’s next?
Read more

“When you look at the damage to the party’s image, its reputation, its
ability to do anything substantive or serious, this is a week of
unmitigated disaster for the Republican party,” said Rick Wilson, co-
founder of the Lincoln Project, a pro-democracy and anti-Trump group.

The latest setback came on Friday when Jim Jordan, a rightwing Ohio
congressman endorsed by former president Donald Trump, lost a third vote
to become speaker and was then unceremoniously dumped by Republicans as
their nominee. The majority leader, Steve Scalise, said they were going to “come back and start over” on Monday.

This followed a week of turmoil remarkable even by the fractious standards
of the Trump era, with ideological disagreements merging with personal vendettas in a combustible mix. After Kevin McCarthy was ousted on 3
October and Scalise failed to garner enough backing, Jordan, a bare
knuckle rightwinger and election denier, had made an unlikely effort to
unite the party.

In the first floor vote on Tuesday, the House Republican conference chair, Elise Stefanik, formally nominated Jordan and aimed high by quoting the
Bible (Esther 4:14) to claim that Jordan would be America’s speaker “for
such a time as this”. But 20 Republicans holdouts denied him the gavel.

A day later, Jordan tried again but this time 22 Republicans opposed him.
There was a sense of absurdity as some called out alternative names such
as John Boehner, a former speaker who quit eight years ago.

Meanwhile it emerged that Jordan’s allies in the “Make America great
again” (Maga) movement had deployed a hardball pressure campaign. Every
member who voted against him said they had received a barrage of angry
phone calls and messages.

Congressman Don Bacon said he received death threats and his wife slept
with a loaded gun near her bedside one night. Others said their families
had been threatened – indicative of dangerously violent undercurrents in American politics that Trump’s recent rhetoric has only encouraged.
The seat for speaker of the House remains empty after a failed third
ballot to elect a new speaker at the US Capitol on Friday.
The seat for speaker of the House remains empty after a failed third
ballot to elect a new speaker at the US Capitol on Friday. Photograph:
Bonnie Cash/UPI/Shutterstock

But the intimidation tactics had the opposite effect of that intended by hardening the resolve of the holdouts. Congressman Drew Ferguson said the
death threats against his family were “unacceptable, unforgivable and will never be tolerated”. Congresswoman Mariannette Miller-Meeks added: “One
thing I cannot stomach or support is a bully.”

On Thursday, tragedy turned to farce. Jordan agreed to suspend his
campaign in favor of a resolution that would temporarily expand the powers
of the acting speaker, Patrick McHenry, to get the House moving again. But
that went down like a lead balloon at a closed-door meeting of Republicans where tempers flared.

On Friday the opposition grew to 25 Republicans, an election result
that not even Jordan could deny

McCarthy yelled at Matt Gaetz, the Florida congressman behind his ousting,
when Gaetz tried to seize a microphone. The former speaker explained to reporters later: “I told him to sit down, and he sat down. I think the
entire conference screamed at him. Listen, the whole country, I think,
would scream at Matt Gaetz right now.”

After the meeting, Jordan announced that the McHenry plan would be
scrapped and that he would fight on after all. “I’m still running for
speaker,” he declared. “I plan to go to the floor and get the votes and
win this race.” But on Friday the opposition grew to 25 Republicans, an election result that not even Jordan could deny.

Soon after he lost the party nomination in a secret ballot, putting
Republicans back to square one. Critics saw it as the awful spectacle of a party – held together by the glue of grievance, “owning the libs” and a
cult of personality – coming apart at the seams.

Kurt Bardella, a Democratic strategist, said: “We are seeing the
inevitable outcome of years of neglect, years of lack of leadership, years
of lack of courage culminate with what is a completely ungovernable and dysfunctional Republican party. The fact that there isn’t a single
Republican right now who can get 217 votes is illustrative of deep schisms within the party and these deep wounds that there is no healing from.”

Bardella, a former spokesperson and senior adviser for Republicans on the
House oversight committee, added: “Time and again the bad actors in the Republican party have been rewarded for their bad behavior. They get
rewarded with television time. They get rewarded with raising millions of dollars in contributions.
Matt Gaetz. ‘The whole country, I think, would scream at Matt Gaetz right
now,’ said Kevin McCarthy.
Matt Gaetz. ‘I think the entire conference screamed at him. Listen, the
whole country, I think, would scream at Matt Gaetz right now,’ said Kevin McCarthy. Photograph: Alex Brandon/AP

“They get rewarded with plum committee assignments. Whether it’s Jordan or
a Matt Gaetz or Marjorie Taylor Greene, who time and again we’re told
represent the fringe of the party, they continue to be elevated and
empowered by the leadership that’s in charge.”

Now ending its third week without a leader, the House cannot act on a
$106bn national security package unveiled by Joe Biden on Friday that
would bolster US border security and send aid to Israel and Ukraine.
Congress also faces a 17 November deadline to pass funding to keep the government open.

Jeffries has said Democrats are “ready, willing and able” to partner with centrist Republicans on a path to reopen the House. In the meantime the
chaos should, in theory, present a campaign gift to Democrats in next
year’s elections, contrasting Biden’s steady wartime leadership with a
party at war with itself.

Wendy Schiller, a political scientist at Brown University in Providence,
Rhode Island, said: “It’s a slow drip. People are still going to work and living their lives so they’re not worried about it. But independent voters
who have been uncomfortable with the very right wing of the Republican
party, whether it’s Trump or anybody else, will get more uncomfortable
because this is threatening the stability of the federal government to
function at all.

“It’s one thing to be chaotic if you’re Trump – but it’s another to not be
able to pass any legislation at all.”


https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/oct/21/jim-jordan-house-speaker- republicans-dysfunction

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