News and updates

After Friday’s failed attempt to elect a Speaker, the House Republicans as regathering later today for a “candidate forum” to hear from the nine Members who have submitted their names for consideration by yesterday’s deadline.

Here is a just a quick recap of what happened on Friday for those of you who weren’t playing along at home:

Jim Jordan of Ohio– after making a U-turn on a proposal to give Speaker Pro Temp Patrick McHenry of North Carolina additional authority– took his candidacy to the floor for the third time.  He lost again, losing more votes.  After that, the Republicans reconvened amongst themselves for a secret ballot vote to see if Jordan could actually muster enough support if they were to vote again.  As it turned out only, only about 85 Republicans said that they would support Jordan for Speaker (there are 221 Republicans in the House currently).  The result forced Jordan to remove himself as the Speaker-designee.

What we now have a situation in which those who are interested in being considered for Speaker were given until yesterday afternoon to submit their names for consideration.  As noted above, the Republican conference is scheduled to hold a forum later this evening during which the candidates are expected to make their pitch on why they should be supported.  The current plan, which could change, is to hold another vote on Tuesday.

The nine Members who submitted their names for consideration are as follows:

• Jack Bergman of Michigan
• Byron Donalds of Florida
• Tom Emmer of Minnesota
• Kevin Hern of Oklahoma
• Mike Johnson of Louisiana
• Dan Meuser of Pennsylvania
• Gary Palmer of Alabama
• Austin Scott of Georgia
• Pete Sessions of Texas

Read more about them and the current situation here, here, and here.

The latest development is that the resolution to empower Patrick McHenry has been pushed aside by the Republican conference as Jordan is insisting that he is still actively running for Speaker.  The members emerged after a three-hour meeting, still looking for clarity.

Read more about the developments here and here. 

Adding further intrigue to the current state of things in the House, Jim Jordan is set to pause his pursuit of the Speakership.  Instead, he is planning to endorse a plan to empower Patrick McHenry of North Carolina with additional authorities temporarily in order to allow the House to take up substantive matters.  A number of questions and issues with that plan remain, however, such as:

• Details about exactly how long McHenry would be elevated and the authorities he would have remain unclear.
• With McHenry in a temporary role and Jordan not officially abandoning his pursuit of the Speaker position, Jordan would still be the Speaker-designate.  This would allow him additional time to try to build additional support for his candidacy while McHenry presides over the House.  Whether Jordan seeks future votes on the floor for Speaker is uncertain.
• The question about a future vote on Jordan leads to another question, this one related to whether Democrats would support the move bestow additional authorities to McHenry.  A number of Republicans have publicly stated their opposition to giving the Speaker Pro Temp position additional powers.  Given that the proposal requires a majority to pass, those pushing the idea would need Democratic support.

Needless to say, things still remain very fluid.  Read more about the developments here, here, and here.

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.