Washington-. United States President Joe Biden today criticized Republicans’ inability to elect the new House Speaker, calling their public struggles an embarrassment for the country.
“It doesn’t give a good image. It’s not a good thing,” Biden told reporters from the White House gardens before traveling to Kentucky where he will attend an infrastructure-themed event.
For the President, the spectacle of the deadlock in the House of Commons is not his “problem”, but he regrets that “the rest of the world sees it”.
The House of Representatives will meet again this Wednesday to try to unlock the vote and elect the president for the 118th Legislature after three failed attempts the previous day.
House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy (California) lost the vote in a row, unprecedented in 100 years.
McCarthy did not win the support of the so-called Freedom Caucus, which includes the most conservative wing of Republican congressmen who are also loyal to former President Donald Trump (2017-2021).
The candidate never received the 218 votes required for his election on any poll, although Republicans hold a 222-seat majority after the Nov. 8 midterm elections.
Amid the dilemma, Trump asked House Republicans to support McCarthy, urging “not to turn a great victory into a huge and embarrassing defeat,” he wrote in a message he posted to his Truth Social account.
According to local media, the ex-governor has been holding talks over the past few hours over the controversy that is keeping the third-highest political position in the US hierarchy at bay.
Former House Speakers Nancy Pelosi (Democrat, California) and John Boehner (Republican, Ohio) won by just 216 votes each in 2021 and 2015.
The last time multiple ballots were held to elect the Speaker of the House of Representatives was in 1923.