House Speaker stalemate finally over as weary Republicans elect some guy

And we have a winner! 

Sort of. At last. For the moment… 

[Quickly checks the CSPAN feed…] 

Yes, yes. We do indeed still have a winner. 

The only strong certainty throughout these weeks of stalemate was that we wouldn’t recognise the name of the person who eventually emerged from the pack. Famous names flashed briefly across the headlines, but it was Mike Johnson of Louisiana who was finally elected to the speakership on Wednesday and became second in line to the presidency. 

Johnson won for a variety of reasons but not least was the sense of desperation and bone-numbing fatigue that had settled over Republicans. Johnson, it seems, offends the least number of his fellow members of Congress, which couldn’t be said about the previous nominees.  

Last week, it looked like the House Republicans wouldn’t sort out their problems any time soon. It seemed to be one of those irresolvable problems that politics occasionally throws up, which are less about policy than pure logic. You know those propositional statements you learn at school?  

Dogs are not cats therefore cats cannot bark.  

And yet, for one brief window, late Thursday, it looked like the cats were indeed barking and there was a breakthrough. Republicans claimed to have kicked the can down the road by reaching a broad agreement to leave Interim Speaker Patrick McHenry in place. By voting to give him temporary powers to oversee proceedings in the House, the Republicans would be able to avoid the government shutdown. Because make no mistake, that would have been bad for Democrats but even worse for Republicans. Right now, the US government is only funded until November 17. Nobody wanted this crisis to escalate into one that shuts down the entire government.  

It was widely reported that Jim Jordan had agreed to the deal, which also made strategic sense. He’d already lost two votes and needed time to rally support/bully Republicans into lending him their votes. Only these things are never that simple and the phrase “herding cats” comes to mind.  

Barking cats with a perchance for going jacketless and rolling up their shirt sleeves….  

No sooner had I written that it looked like the crisis might have been averted than Jordan decided to force through a third vote, which he subsequently lost. Not only did he lose it, but he saw even more support slip away. That too was no surprise. The Jordan candidacy had always been surrounded by rumours of dark political arts being practised; phone calls to the families of House members who had voted against him. Nick LaLota, a representative from New York, shared a message in which he was told to “Go f*ck yourself and die.” Don Bacon of Nebraska revealed his wife had started to sleep with a gun under her pillow because of the death threats they’d received. 

It was pretty obvious that such tactics would hurt the Jordan nomination and so it proved. Republicans went back behind closed doors and had a vote in which they not-too-subtly told Jordan that he would never get the votes. 

So, Jordan was out. 

Next, they got behind Tom Emmer who as the House Majority Whip is the third most powerful Republican in the House. Surely, he was a figure they could get behind…  

And they did… 

Until Donald Trump sent out a Truth Social post in which he said “Voting for a Globalist RINO like Tom Emmer would be a tragic mistake!” 

Trump’s role here isn’t that profound or shocking but it does go to the heart of the problem. On another day we could talk about his casual use of the word “globalist”, which is a right-wing trope with some fairly nasty connotations, but Trump is always pulling triggers even if he doesn’t quite know what those triggers do beyond going BOOM! The former president is why the Republicans are in such trouble. Even if the true “Trumplicans” are a tiny minority within the House, the GOP majority of seven votes means that only a few rebels can prevent the majority from winning any vote without Democratic support. And, again, that’s unlikely. Many Republicans show no signs of bipartisanship and Democrats appear to have enough pride that they won’t support Republicans frothing with all manner of abusive hate towards them. This was the Kevin McCarthy problem. Had he been a little more conciliatory to the Democrats, he might still be in office (though, of course, he would have become a target for even more hate inside his party). 

But back to Emmer. Once Trump made his proclamation, Emmer’s nomination was dead in the water. Emmer dropped out of the race even before a vote could be called, just like Steve Scalise had done a couple of weeks ago. 

Fast forward 24 hours and we now have Representative Mike Johnson becoming the House’s new Speaker and perhaps by the time I press SEND on this article he’ll still be in office. These targets have been moving too quickly, it’s been best not to track names. Just track the context. 

Trump had endorsed Johnson, which is significant in that it is a reminder that Trump remains the most powerful kingmaker in the GOP. Johnson’s victory should, however, allow matters to settle, even if this consensus has to be considered fragile. Republicans will likely move quickly to change the rules to prevent this from happening again, but it will be interesting to see how Johnson makes the slim Republican majority work for him as he seeks to strike the same kind of deals with Democrats over the budget that led to McCarthy’s demise. And on that point, McCarthy must feel pretty bitter given that the underlying reality has not shifted.  

House Republicans remain a coalition in which a minority can no longer be relied on to support the majority. Many of the Freedom Caucus believe the big federal project is broken and Washington cannot be trusted to serve the interests of the people in the states. There are people in this minority within the majority – Matt Gaetz, Lauren Boebert, and Jim Jordan but there are others – who seem to delight in the animosity that others hold towards them. There does not seem to be a form of shame or political coercion that brings them into line. 

Is Mike Johnson of Louisiana the solution to that problem? America – indeed, the World – needs a little stability in Washington so one can only hope, even if the deep logic of the situation remains as intractable as it ever was. Cats still can’t bark, and the GOP remains a party divided unto itself. 

@DavidWaywell  

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