Friday’s 14th round of voting in the House of Representatives was particularly tense when a handful of elected Trumpists blocked the 4th-day election of the House of Commons President.
The US House of Representatives again failed to elect its new President on Friday, January 6, and was left completely paralyzed by dissent within the Republican ranks. Favorite Kevin McCarthy has still not made it to the pole after a fourth day of negotiations and 14 ballots that still appear hopeless. This last ballot was overshadowed by tensions in the hemicycle. In live footage, California lawmakers approached the group of Trumpists paralyzing his access to the roost and called out to them in an open attempt to get them to change their votes. The Clerk of Congress urged elected officials to remain calm.
A fifteenth ballot was to be kept going.
Lively debates
The hard core of the very conservative elected officials are using the wafer-thin Republican majority won in the midterm elections in November as a spoilsport. And encamped on its positions for four days, a scenario not seen for more than 160 years. This paralysis of the American Congress has very concrete consequences: Without a “speaker”, the third most important figure in American politics after the president and the vice president, elected officials cannot take the oath and thus vote on a bill. It is also impossible to take part in parliamentary committees or receive information classified as defense secrets.
Kevin McCarthy has been on the Republican staff for ten years and has no credible competitor. Only the name of the group leader Steve Scalise circulated as a possible alternative, without his chances appearing to appear serious. There was palpable impatience among members of the Grand Old Party, who broadly supported McCarthy’s candidacy, leading to very heated debates within that faction.
Many of them also left the chamber in protest during Friday’s speech by Matt Gaetz, one of the elected leaders of the Trumpist revolt.