McCarthy’s fate has become irrelevant
WASHINGTON — On the fourth of 12 (and counting) failed attempts to elect Kevin McCarthy as speaker, Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., complained that Democrats and the media were enjoying the House Republicans’ meltdown too much.
“In some ways they’re salivating,” the lawmaker complained in his speech re-re-renominating McCarthy, R-Calif. “The schadenfreude is palpable.”
As a longtime reviewer of political theater, I can’t find anything enjoyable about this performance.
This is what happens when a political party, year after year, systematically destroys the norms and institutions of democracy. This is what happens when those expert at tearing things down are put in charge of governing. The dysfunction has been building over years of government shutdowns, debt-default showdowns and other fabricated crises, and now anti-government Republicans have used their new majority to bring the House itself to a halt.
This is insurrection by other means: Two years to the day since the Jan. 6 invasion of the Capitol, Republicans are still attacking the functioning of government. McCarthy opened the door to the chaos by excusing Donald Trump’s fomenting of the attack and welcoming a new class of election deniers to his caucus. Now he’s trying to save his own political ambitions by agreeing to institutionalize the chaos — not just for the next two years but for Congress in the future as well.
On Thursday, the day McCarthy failed on an 11th consecutive ballot to secure the speakership, he formally surrendered to the 21 GOP extremists denying him the job. He agreed to allow any member of the House to force a vote at will to “vacate” his speakership — essentially agreeing to be in permanent jeopardy of losing his job. He agreed to put rebels on the Rules Committee, giving them sway over what gets a vote on the House floor, and in key committee leadership posts. He agreed to unlimited amendments to spending bills, inviting two years of mayhem.
Perhaps worst of all, the McCarthy-aligned super-PAC, the Conservative Leadership Fund, agreed that it would no longer work against far-right extremists in the vast majority of Republican primaries. Essentially, McCarthy tried to placate the crazies in his caucus by giving up every tool he had to maintain order in the House.
It’s not clear at this writing whether even this abject surrender will secure McCarthy the speakership. But it hardly matters. Regardless of the outcome, the saboteurs have already won.
Yes, the Republicans’ televised, self-inflicted debacle is gripping, in the train-wreck sense. As spectacles go, you’d have to look back more than 160 years to find a comparable failure to elect a speaker. Republicans referred to one another as the “Taliban” and “terrorists” and “hostage takers.” They traded obscenities in a caucus meeting. One of the anti-McCarthy Republicans, Matt Gaetz of Florida, publicly called McCarthy a “squatter” for prematurely occupying the speaker’s Capitol office.
On the House floor Thursday, Dan Bishop, R-N.C., a white man from the South, accused Cori Bush, Mo., a Black Democrat, of “grotesquely racist rhetoric.” The day before, Kat Cammack, R-Fla., insinuated groundlessly in her speech re-re-re-re-renominating McCarthy that Democrats were drunk on the job.
Democrats howled for her words to be struck from the record, but because there was no speaker, there was nothing to be done. “There are no rules,” McCarthy said from his seat on the floor.
No rules. No functioning. And essentially, no House. The elected members of Congress cannot be sworn in (although the office of New York Republican George Santos, who fabricated much of his life story, erroneously issued a press release stating that he had been sworn in). Bills can’t be introduced. Committee memberships and chairmanships can’t be assigned, and staff can’t be hired. Newly elected lawmakers can’t access emails or office supplies. House Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik even called off her colleagues’ feeding.
“Due to the House adjourning, there will not be pizza and salads tonight,” announced an email from her office Tuesday evening.
But sabotaging government is no joke. The incoming Republican chairmen of the Armed Services, Foreign Affairs and Intelligence committees warned that the standoff could “place the safety and security of the United States at risk.” Even House Chaplain Margaret Kibben sounded the alarm. “Protect us that in this imbroglio of indecision we do not expose ourselves to the incursion of our adversary,” she prayed at the start of Thursday’s session. “Watch over the seeming discontinuity of our governance and the perceived vulnerability of our national security.”
There was only one upside to the anarchy: The government no longer controlled the TV cameras in the House chamber. Americans at home could watch leaders huddling with rebels, farright Gaetz conferring with farleft Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and the serial fabricator Santos sitting alone, discreetly picking his nose.