A band of House Republicans made a historic move this week to punish their own leader, sending the House into chaos by ousting Kevin McCarthy as speaker. The unprecedented vote to oust McCarthy has only led to more turmoil in the days since as Republicans have grappled with the fallout of the speaker-less House.
On Thursday, former President Donald Trump was rumored to be going to Capitol Hill and floated the possibility of serving as speaker for a “short period of time” – a highly improbable idea. Then he abruptly changed course and scrapped those plans, endorsing Rep. Jim Jordan instead.
On Friday morning, a candidate forum on Fox News with Jordan and Majority Leader Steve Scalise was announced for Monday. By midday, furious backlash from GOP rank-and-file caused both to pull out from the event.
And McCarthy provided his own whipsaw Friday afternoon, when a flurry of reports emerged that he would resign after a new speaker was chosen. He quickly denied to reporters that he had any plans to leave before the end of his term.
Remember a couple three decades ago when we would shake our heads at the chaos of Italian politics with coalitions, porn stars, and nazis? We were so superior.