Can Kevin McCarthy Wrangle a Restless Majority — If the GOP Gets One?

Before the final results determining control of the House of Representatives are even in, Republicans and Democrats alike are beginning to question how the current minority leader, Congressman Kevin McCarthy, will manage what looks likely to be a slim majority — if he will be given the chance at all.A conservative Republican who represents Florida’s 7th district, Congressman Anthony Sabatini, holds a personal grudge against the minority leader, who spent some $10 million to primary Mr. Sabatini in the 2022 Republican primary, propelling Congressman-elect Cory Mills to the nomination.“That money could’ve been spent lifting up the Republicans we just saw lose,” Mr. Sabatini wrote in the wake of Tuesday’s weak Republican performance. “McCarthy is a failed disgrace and must NOT become Speaker.”Fox News’s White House correspondent, Jacqui Heinrich, reported that some Republicans are already preparing to turn on Mr. McCarthy. “Knives are out for Kevin McCarthy,” one GOP source told her. “If he is under 225 [seats], expect Scalise to make a move quickly for speaker.”The House Republican whip, Representative Steve Scalise, has since announced he will be seeking the House majority leader position, leaving open the speaker role for Mr. McCarthy, who nonetheless is in a vulnerable position.Unlike in the Senate, where the GOP leadership has been vocal about the influence of President Trump and his allies in nominating low-quality candidates for office, Mr. McCarthy was expected to deliver a “red wave” Tuesday. In August 2021, Mr. McCarthy was counting his eggs before they hatched when he said of the current speaker of the House, “I want you to watch Nancy Pelosi hand me that gavel. It will be hard not to hit her with it.”Given that Mr. McCarthy is likely to have hard time getting his party to unify behind a House leader who under-delivered in the midterms, Mr. McCarthy might want to ask Ms. Pelosi for some tips.The minority leader will likely be in charge of a tenuous and slim House majority in 2023 — that is, if Republicans choose to elect him speaker after Tuesday’s lackluster showing. On Wednesday, NBC was projecting that the Republican majority could be as slim as 218-217.If elected, one of the chief concerns Mr. McCarthy will have is to parlay his coalition of Republicans into a functioning majority — a tall task.Mr. McCarthy will need to whip votes from both the establishment Republicans and the right wing of his party in an environment where just a handful of votes could derail his agenda and stall out the lower chamber.The most vexatious faction for him could be the House Freedom Caucus, which since its inception in 2015 has prevented multiple speakers-to-be from taking up the gavel and forced concessions from their own party and from Democrats.In the current Congress, there are 42 members of the Freedom Caucus. Even if the caucus is greatly diminished next year — and there’s no reason to think it will be — just a fraction of these representatives could upend Mr. McCarthy’s agenda by withholding votes.On the other side of the party, the Republican Governance Group — formerly the Tuesday Group and before that the Tuesday Lunch Bunch — is a group of moderate Republicans that could also upend Mr. McCarthy’s agenda.Currently there are 44 members of the group, meaning if they retain even a quarter of their members, they will also be able to throttle efforts to move anything through a Republican House.The problem for Mr. McCarthy, or whoever ends up leading this Republican coalition, will be that any group of 10 representatives will be able to stall out legislation.On the Democratic side, the leftist “squad” has often made headlines for blocking legislation in the House or for picking fights with Speaker Pelosi over strategy and philosophy.However, over the past two years Ms. Pelosi has always been able to cut deals with or whip votes from the fringes of her party, delivering a considerable amount of legislation in a short time frame.There is reason to believe that Mr. McCarthy might not be able to do the same, and it’s probably best exemplified by the tension between the party’s establishment and its Trump loyalists, like Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene.In a mid-October interview with the New York Times, Ms. Greene suggested that if Mr. McCarthy does not give her considerable influence, he will suffer politically.“I think that to be the best speaker of the House and to please the base, he’s going to give me a lot of power and a lot of leeway,” she said. “And if he doesn’t, they’re going to be very unhappy about it.”“And that’s not in any way a threat at all,” she added. “I just think that’s reality.”Following a midterm performance that has left many Republicans understandably questioning the party’s relationship with President Trump and candidates in his mold, Republicans are also beginning to question whether Mr. McCarthy should be leader.Mr. Trump has said of the results, “I think if they win I should get all the credit. If they lose, I should not be blamed at all.”Regardless of whether blame does end up landing on Mr. Trump, it’s clear already that delivering a “red wave” in the House was Mr. McCarthy’s responsibility.

Can Kevin McCarthy Wrangle a Restless Majority — If the GOP Gets One?

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