Last Call For Meet The New Ringmaster, Again

With Steve Scalise out. the House GOP is now turning to Trump-endorsed Rep. Jim Jordan as a Speaker candidate, and it looks like Jordan has even less support than Scalise did.

The House GOP has entered an angrier and more bewildered phase in its leadership crisis.

The fractious Republican conference has rejected a second speaker hopeful in eight days — this time, Kevin McCarthy’s longtime heir apparent, Steve Scalise. While Republicans appear to be turning next to Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), some are already airing open doubts that Jordan can pull off what the majority leader couldn’t.

The lesson Republicans have learned in the frenetic week since McCarthy’s fall: They have no clear choice for leader who can unite their ranks — no matter how long this drags out and their chamber of Congress is paralyzed.

It’s not just GOP centrists sparring with the hard right. It’s not just McCarthy loyalists secretly fuming at Scalise or his allies. There’s mounting anger across the entire conference that no GOP speaker candidate, including Jordan, appears able to prevail under the current margins.

“We need to all recognize that this is much bigger than just one person or any single person’s petty feelings,” said Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-N.Y.), who had voted for Jordan but publicly backed Scalise after he won the internal election.

It won’t be easy for any candidate to get past the internal spats that have only worsened as the GOP’s speaker fight drags on with no end in sight.

“Personally, I think it may end up being a compromise candidate,” Rep. Greg Murphy (R-N.C.) said. While Murphy said there was “no doubt” Jordan would run, he acknowledged that getting the needed 217 GOP votes is “going to be hard.”

At some point, I would expect the Democrats to make a move here, with more backchannel routes and somebody Hakeem Jeffries can support. In a logical world, that would mean peeling off a half-dozen Republican to vote for Jeffries himself.

Of course, in a logical world, Jeffries would have been Speaker already.