‘Dysfunctional, disorganised, broken’: The GOP’s speaker race is a total mess

Nobody can effectively make the case for their side in the House Republican conference

U.S. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) speaks to reporters as he leaves a House Republican caucus meeting at the U.S. Capitol on October 12, 2023 in Washington, DC. (Getty Images)

At least Steve Scalise didn’t start measuring the drapes in the speaker’s office.

As of Thursday afternoon, the House Republican conference appears far from picking a speaker of the House, nine days after the motion to vacate that deposed Kevin McCarthy.

Republicans spent much of the first part of Thursday in the basement of the Capitol once again deliberating about whether to promote Mr Scalise from House majority leader to speaker. If that sounds familiar, it’s because they spent much of Wednesday in the Longworth House Office Building before they nominated Mr Scalise.

That did little to assuage frustration, particularly from many supporters of Rep Jim Jordan (R-OH). But all of the discontent – both from opponents and supporters – seems to betray the fact that nobody really knows why they are doing what they are doing or how exactly how to do it. Rather, conversations with members gives the impression that Republicans are winging it.

Perhaps the angriest, and loudest, voice in the House GOP conference right now is Rep Chip Roy (R-TX). A member of the House Freedom Caucus who initially opposed Mr McCarthy before he flipped his vote in January, he had initially proposed an amendment that would require that any nominee receive 217 of the 221 votes in the conference. Republicans tabled the motion, which enraged Mr Roy.

“I will not be voting for Steve on the floor, so they better not force this to the floor,” Mr Roy told reporters. “I've got strong disagreements in the way things were carried out yesterday and we're going to figure this out here.”

Mr Scalise and Mr Jordan hold almost identical policy views and both supported Mr McCarthy’s bid for speaker in January. Both voted to object to the 2020 election results on January 6 (Mr Roy, meanwhile, voted to certify the election). Their major split is that Mr Scalise voted for the continuing resolution to keep the government open, which is unsurprising since he’s a member of leadership, while Mr Jordan opposed it.

If Mr Roy’s simple opposition boils down to whether the rest of the conference opposed his amendment, his rationale for opposing Mr Scalise is thinner than his reasons for blocking Mr McCarthy. The inverse, of course, is it might be harder to get him to “yes” this time.

On Wednesday, we reported that Rep Ken Buck (R-CO), who voted to boot Mr McCarthy, said he voted “present” after he asked Mr Scalise and Mr Jordan whether they believed the 2020 election was legitimate. Mr Buck is correct that the House GOP should have to deal with reality – if not for virtuous reasons, then to realise that election denial prevents them from making the right moves to keep and expand their majority.

But Mr Buck had such deeply seated convictions, those should have prevented him from opposing Mr McCarthy, who also voted to object on January 6 and flew to Mar-a-Lago to patch things up with Donald Trump in the days after January 6, rather than voting for Mr McCarthy from the beginning. (Mr Buck likely also voted to vacate the chair partially because Mr McCarthy gave Rep Thomas Massie of Kentucky a subcommittee chairmanship Mr Buck was in line to receive).

The evasiveness is (almost) enough to make this dispatcher admire Rep Marjorie Taylor Greene’s answer that she supports Mr Jordan and opposes Mr Scalise because of the latter’s cancer treatment. It is a cruel and mean-spirited answer that doesn’t take into account the fact Mr Scalise largely continued leading the House GOP conference after he was shot in 2017. But at least she gives a reason.

But Mr Scalise’s apologists give answers that are just as half-hearted as his critics. Rep Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY) initially backed Mr Jordan but got behind Mr Scalise after Wednesday’s vote.

“No one has gotten up and given a reason that I believe is like a valid reason,” she told reporters. “So I can't I can't tell you what the reasons are because I haven't heard anything that warrants what we're doing”

But she could not really give a sufficient case for Mr Scalise on Thursday afternoon except that Mr Scalise is a nice guy.

“Steve Scalise is a good person,” she said. “He's a he's a good man. He's is a person who I think can be a good communicator and leader for this conference.”

That all may be fine, but it doesn’t list which traits make him a good communicator or leader for the GOP.

Of course, there are the ones who give even worse answers, such Rep Troy Nehls of Texas, who has reiterated his initial idea of nominating Mr Trump to be the leader of the House. But Mr Nehls seemed to admit the conference was in trouble and nobody could get enough votes.

“We're dysfunctional, we're disorganised and we're broken,” he told me. “One of the members said in there, you know, I don't think the Lord Jesus Himself could get 217.”

And no miracle is coming for House Republicans as of right now.