MTG tears into the 19 Republicans who voted against McCarthy, calls their rebellion ‘the worst thing that could possibly happen’
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Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said that the Republican Party is endangering its hard-won House majority amid bitter infighting over Rep. Kevin McCarthy’s bid to become House Speaker.
“If the base only understood that 19 Republicans voting against McCarthy are playing Russian roulette with our hard earned Republican majority right now. This is the worst thing that could possibly happen,” Greene, a Georgia Republican, wrote on Twitter.
Greene was responding to speculation that 6 Republicans could side with Democrats to pick a House Speaker and form a coalition if the deadlock over McCarthy’s candidacy can’t be resolved.
California Rep. Jim Costa told CBS News that discussions are underway among some centrists about the proposal.
McCarthy repeatedly failed in his bid to win the 218 votes needed to be elected House Speaker on Tuesday, marking the first time since 1923 that the House adjourned having failed to elect a Speaker after the first round of voting.
McCarthy is opposed by 19 Republicans from the hard right of the party, who are seeking sweeping concessions in return for their backing. Some members have, in recent days, accused him of being an establishment stooge.
The battle over the Speaker role has exposed deep divisions between Republican moderates who back McCarthy and the party’s hard right. It has also exposed infighting among the hard-right faction, with Greene, one of its most prominent members, backing McCarthy, and Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida among his most high-profile critics.
Greene is backing McCarthy having reportedly struck an agreement that she will be returned to House committee roles should he win.
She was removed from committees by the then-Democratic majority in 2021 for promoting conspiracy theories and violent rhetoric.
Voting will continue until a candidate secures enough votes to win. Even if he wins, McCarthy will be badly damaged by his failure to secure enough votes in the first few rounds.