News and updates

The House is currently scheduled to reconvene at noon today to vote for the third time on Jim Jordan’s nomination to be Speaker.  While several of his supporters have expressed confidence that he will ultimately prevail, other Members predicted after yesterday’s vote that the opposition will likely grow on this and any other future attempts.

At the same time, there is a push among some Republicans to provide additional authorities to Speaker Pro Tempore Patrick McHenry of North Carolina in an attempt to allow the House to move on a number of pending issues, such as FY2024 appropriations (the continuing resolution that currently funds the government expires at midnight, Nov. 18) as well as potential funding to Israel and Ukraine.  Details remain murky on the details.

After all the votes were cast and counted just a few minutes ago, the House was still in search of a Speaker.  Jim Jordan of Ohio fell short on the second round of votes, actually losing two votes between the first and second rounds.  Twenty-two Republicans voted for someone other than Jordan for Speaker, leaving him with 199 votes.  Democrats once again voted unanimously for Hakeem Jeffries of New York.

The House is currently in recess.

When yesterday’s initial vote on Speaker did not lead to a victory for Jim Jordan, questions arose about when we might see another floor vote.  Initially, a second round had been scheduled for later in the evening yesterday.  That was ultimately postponed, and was rescheduled to approximately 11 AM ET today.

Not surprisingly, a myriad different conversations have taken place between the 20 Republican holdouts and Jordan’s supporters in an attempt to win them over since yesterday’s vote.  In remains to be seen how successful the additional push was.

Read more about the recent developments here, here, and here.

Well, the House reconvened at Noon today as scheduled to vote on a new Speaker… and after that vote, the chamber is still in search of a new leader.

Jim Jordan of Ohio, who had become the Republican nominee only on Friday, failed to convince enough of his conference members to support him, at least on this round of votes.  Once again, the Democrats nominated Hakeem Jeffries of New York as their nominee.  After all of the votes had been counted, Jordan won 200 votes, Jeffries received 212, and other candidates received the support of 20 Republicans.

The House currently stand in recess in the aftermath of the vote.

Much has happened since Steve Scalise of Louisiana stepped down as a Republican candidate for Speaker.  After that, Austin Scott of Georgia entered the race as an alternative to Jim Jordan of Ohio, who had finished second to Scalise.  During another Republican conference meeting, Jordan emerged victorious over Scott.  However, Jordan only had 124 votes; Scott, who was a last-minute candidate, garnered 81.  The House has been in recess since Friday and Jordan and his allies have been looking for votes over the weekend.

It appears, however, as of Monday morning, he still has ways to go before he reaches the 217 votes needed to actually become speaker.  A number of moderates and House Republicans who represent districts won by President Biden are not comfortable with Jordan– a co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, one of the biggest supporters of Donald Trump, and one of the chairmen leading an impeachment inquiry against Biden, just to name a few of their concerns– becoming the leader of the Republican conference.

At this point, the House Republicans are scheduled to reconvene this evening to assess the situation.  The entire House is currently scheduled to vote on a Speaker on Tuesday.  Given what has happened recently, it is more than possible that the vote could slip.

Read more about the developments here, here, and here.