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Hello to The Best & The Brightest readers, particularly those frustrated by the Republican civil war in Congress—one that’s left the House of Representatives leaderless and neutered as Israel begins a bloody and horrifying war. But, as Abby Livingston and I regret to inform you, even though the G.O.P. conference nominated a candidate this afternoon, there won’t be an actual Speaker of the House anytime soon. At the very least, here’s what we know so far.
First, Abby with the immediate fallout of Steve Scalise’s qualified victory…
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| Scalise Anxiety & D.C. Silly Season |
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| On the face of it, Steve Scalise’s 113-99 victory over Jim Jordan in the House Republican leadership race was a major win for the G.O.P. establishment. But Scalise faces a major uphill battle to secure the gavel, and the House is no more unified than it was when members ejected Kevin McCarthy eight days ago.
Shortly after the vote tally, a succession of House Republicans publicly stated they would not support Scalise in a floor vote, where success requires a majority of votes in the full U.S. House—a significantly higher hurdle than the Republicans-only conference vote. Scalise has to win over nearly every single Jordan supporter, which, at least for now, does not appear to be in the cards. A sense of foreboding prevailed in the G.O.P. circles that I connected with this afternoon, despite Jordan’s offer to nominate Scalise to signal his support. “What’s not clear (yet) is whether Jordan actually controls the folks who are causing trouble in his name or whether he’s just a cudgel against the establishment,” Republican lobbyist Liam Donovan wrote on Twitter/X.
Coming out of the Republican vote, one of the most chewed-over questions was how Trump’s endorsement of Jordan did not deliver him the gavel. But this was a secret ballot, and barring an exhaustive pressure campaign on House Republicans to admit who they voted for in a closed-door meeting, there’s no price to pay for individual members privately crossing Trump. (Eventually, of course, Republican members will have to go on the record with their preferred candidate.)
In the midst of all of this, members—especially but not exclusively House Republicans—have settled into a routine of escalating absurdity. To wit: Derrick Van Orden reportedly verbally attacked Biden intelligence officials on Wednesday; Harriet Hageman entered the speaker candidate forum with an unexplained lasso; Nancy Mace posed for photos with a tank top featuring a homemade scarlet ‘A’; George Santos picked up a fresh indictment; and just twelve days ago, Jamaal Bowman pulled a fire alarm in the Cannon building. These are conscious choices members of Congress are making as the House appears to be barreling towards a constitutional crisis.
Manufactured silliness is not new on Capitol Hill, especially over the last five months. What’s striking, however, is that this absurdity is still taking place as the Middle East explodes, and the current House remains incapable of passing a resolution in support of one of our closest allies. The most sober people on Capitol Hill on Wednesday were the just-landed members of a pre-scheduled bipartisan, bicameral CODEL, led by Joni Ernst, that made a stop in Israel. In a meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu, they presented a unified American front.
One of the costs of existing in the political bubble of Capitol Hill is a loss of self-awareness. When Congress is in session, Capitol Hill morphs into an insular village in the blocks between Union Station and Bullfeathers. Should Scalise’s nomination advance to the floor, every professional Republican will be white-knuckling it through the live television broadcast. This is a fragile coalition, and even enthusiastic Scalise-backers in the operative class on Wednesday afternoon expressed anxiety-bordering-on-neurosis over whether Republicans will fall in line.
And once more, into the MAGA breach, to watch the Scalise opposition assemble in real time…
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| War & Scalise |
| A small crew of Republican holdouts—McCarthy loyalists, Jordan fans, media gadflies—are threatening to tank Scalise’s speakership bid, just like they did to his predecessor. How long can the House G.O.P. chaos last? |
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| Does Steve Scalise have the votes? That was the question on Wednesday afternoon after the Louisiana congressman, and McCarthy’s longtime No. 2, whipped 113 members to secure the House G.O.P. nomination for the vacant speakership. Scalise and his allies had been making the case across the Hill that he would be a less volatile, more cooperative leader than his main rival for the gavel, Freedom Caucus founder Jim Jordan. Scalise, after all, has the perfect paper resume for the job: years in leadership at the side of Boehner and Ryan and McCarthy (the two have an icy relationship—another mark in his favor), plus the K Street connections, some conservative street cred, and deep knowledge of Congress’s arcane rules.
Alas, there’s one major hurdle that Scalise and his allies are going to have to overcome as they bring his speakership bid to a full House vote, and it’s precisely the same one that his defenestrated predecessor faced: His right-wing detractors really, really, really don’t like him. A handful of moderates aligned with McCarthy also don’t like him (again, that frosty relationship… ). That’s not to say that most Republicans won’t fall in line for the sake of the party. But it will only take a few holdouts to derail Scalise, as his predecessor knew all too well. “Scalise is a diet McCarthy. A non-starter,” a comms official close to the MAGA wing of the House texted me, just hours after McCarthy got the boot.
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| Over the course of the past several days, a number of Republican insiders have explained why. For one, there is seemingly more passion for Jordan, a founding member of the Freedom Caucus who earned his anti-establishment stripes by instigating any number of government shutdowns, and whose political commitments cannot be denied. He’s also got a better relationship than Scalise with the conservative activists outside Capitol Hill—the ones that frequently serve as a liaison between the House hardliners and the MAGA movement beyond Washington. (A number of them have been lobbying members on Jordan’s behalf, I’m told.)
But the most profound reason this group prefers Jordan over Scalise is personal distrust. Many felt like they could at least negotiate with Kevin, who made concession after concession to gain power, but that they can’t cut those kinds of deals with Steve. “I think Scalise is worse than McCarthy,” another MAGA operative told me.
There are already a wide array of publicly-stated objections to Scalise’s candidacy: Thomas Massie, for instance, said he wanted Scalise to articulate a plan for avoiding an omnibus bill. Marjorie Taylor Greene said Scalise should focus on his battle against cancer, instead of sacrificing “his health in the most difficult position in Congress.” Lauren Boebert accused him of being the tool of “the Swamp and K Street lobbyists.” And don’t expect that to change anytime soon. “Steve Scalise is not getting to 217 on the first ballot, on the second ballot, on any of these public ballots,” the MAGA operative predicted. “He’s not getting close. You have people that are not going to budge.”
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| It’s important to note that Jordan is no longer publicly opposing Scalise: On the contrary, shortly after the conference voted for their nominee, Jordan took to the floor to formally nominate Scalise as their speaker candidate, urging his colleagues to “get back to functioning as the House of Representatives.” But it’s increasingly likely that members who supported Jordan will not necessarily follow his direction—and that even if they do, the early opposition to Scalise presages yet another intraparty civil war.
For many on the far right, whose representatives have been holding hostage the House majority, Scalise’s conservative voting record doesn’t mask the fact that he’s still an ambitious political creature whose career predates Trump—often a nonstarter for MAGA-era Republicans. At least McCarthy was transactional, from their point of view. “[Scalise] was the only member in Republican leadership last year to support Liz Cheney after she impeached Trump,” the MAGA operative noted. “He represents a ruby red district that loves Donald Trump, and Steve Scalise can’t endorse Donald Trump, because his donors won’t allow him to.” (McCarthy notoriously flipped from trying to sever the G.O.P. from Trump after Jan. 6 to shaking hands with him at Mar-a-Lago mere weeks later.)
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| Can the hardliners hold out, especially if Scalise offers them a deal? Yes, conservative hardliners talk a big game about holding the government accountable by any means necessary, but the chaos can only go on for so long before it becomes embarrassing for all involved—especially at a moment where there’s increased pressure for the party to come together in order to address the situation in Israel (not to mention the pesky government shutdown they merely delayed).
Few of my sources are sure exactly how long this next phase of voting might last, or if a new candidate will need to step in. The current structure of the House G.O.P.—a caucus with a majority so slim that 98 percent of them have to be united to get anything done on their own—already led to eight members tanking McCarthy, for mostly personal reasons. It’s reasonable to presume that there are enough diehard, Trump-supporting members who would be willing to do the same to Scalise. But the horse trading portion of this fight has only just begun, and we just don’t like Scalise is not a viable long-term bargaining position, even if it is all they’ve got.
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| FOUR STORIES WE’RE TALKING ABOUT |
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| S.B.F. on Trial |
| An inside exchange on the financial trial of the century. |
| ERIQ GARDNER & TEDDY SCHLEIFER |
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