With the government running out of money again in a little over a month, the House has instead ousted the speaker for the first time in the chamber’s history — with no one to replace him.
Here’s what’s going on.
How the effort to oust McCarthy went down
McCarthy (R-Calif.) lost his job despite the support of a vast majority of Republican lawmakers. That’s because the current House is set up to benefit large majorities of one party, or bipartisanship. Republicans have only a slim majority in the House, so to pass legislation that Democrats oppose — or to keep a speaker the Democrats despise — they have to be nearly unified. They can only afford to lose five Republicans on key votes, and McCarthy lost eight. And he didn’t have the support of a single Democrat.
“The House does not govern as a pure majoritarian body,” explained Matthew Green, a professor of politics at Catholic University and co-author of a book about Newt Gingrich. “It’s not the will of the majority, it’s the will of leadership of the majority party, and if you only bring things to the floor that the majority party wants, and your majority party is small, that gives leverage to a tiny fraction of that party.”
Democrats played a big role in kicking McCarthy out
Democrats thought about voting with a majority of Republicans to help McCarthy keep his job, but ultimately decided not to; every Democrat present voted against McCarthy.
There are lots of reasons Democrats dislike McCarthy: He’s all-in on Donald Trump; he just launched an impeachment inquiry into President Biden over “allegations”; and he thwarted Jan. 6 investigations. But the last straw for them was seeing McCarthy on TV over the weekend trying to blame Democrats for the near-shutdown, reports The Washington Post.
“He dug his own grave,” one person in the know told The Post about why Democrats weren’t saving him.
Who voted against McCarthy?
It was a weird coalition of eight far-right Republicans and all House Democrats present. Here’s a look at how your lawmaker voted.
Who is next in line for speaker?
A temporary speaker was pulled from a secret list that McCarthy made when he became speaker in case of a vacancy. That person is Patrick T. McHenry (R-N.C.). But he may only hold the job for days or months until Republicans can present a nominee for speaker.
That person probably won’t be McCarthy. He said Tuesday night he’s not going to run for speaker again.
Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) is also not a likely candidate. Despite leading the charge to oust McCarthy, NBC News reports that Gaetz is expected to run for Florida governor.
“It all was about getting attention from [the media],” McCarthy told reporters of why he thinks Gaetz made the move to kick him out. "I mean, we’re getting email fundraisers from him.”
We don’t know what happens next
There isn’t anyone who seems willing or able to take the speakership. McCarthy needed four days of voting in January to get the gavel, and he is the sixth Republican speaker to essentially be thrown overboard by his own party.
While Republicans figure out their next steps, it’s not clear how much authority McHenry has to run the House. That’s because a speaker has never been removedbefore, so everything he does is unprecedented. Some experts think the House could pass some legislation that the Constitution deems “necessary and appropriate,” but most other matters might have to wait.
The next speaker probably won’t be a Democrat
There’s another way out of this mess: To work with Democrats and build a center coalition. But to elect a Democratic representative as House speaker Republicans would need to join with Democrats, and there just doesn’t seem to be the political will for that.
“Voters have come to expect that people stay loyal to their parties and not cross party lines,” Green said. “It’s the consequence of this party-first attitude.”
Republicans might kick Matt Gaetz out of Congress for this
“Expel Matt Gaetz,” exclaimed Newt Gingrich, the former Republican House speaker in the 1990s, in a Washington Post op-ed.
And there is a brewing movement to try to do that, reports The Washington Post’s Jacob Bogage. Republicans’ disdain for Gaetz has broken out into the open. In January during the speakership battle that McCarthy won, one Republican lawmaker actually lunged at Gaetz on the House floor before he was restrained. On Tuesday, majority of Republicans wouldn’t let him speak Tuesday from the Republican side of the House chamber. He had to address his colleagues from the Democratic side.
To oust a duly elected member of Congress from their seat is a heavy lift. It would require a two-thirds vote in the House, rather than just a majority. And only five House members have ever been expelled by their colleagues. “If they want to expel me, let me know when they have the votes,” Gaetz said.
This has been updated with the latest news.
