The ex-president has endorsed the congressman for the Speaker role. But that hasn’t been enough to sway the skeptics.The ex-president has endorsed the congressman for the Speaker role. But that hasn’t been enough to sway the skeptics.
It was the second day of chaos on the floor of the House of Representatives when Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) took the previously unthinkable step of thumbing her nose at Donald Trump, the ex-president she otherwise venerates.
“Let’s stop with the campaign smears and tactics to get people to turn against us — even having my favorite president call us and tell us to knock this off. I think it actually needs to be reversed and the [former] president needs to tell Kevin McCarthy you do not have the votes and it’s time to withdraw,” Boebert said. “Ooo”s from Democrats could be heard from the chamber.
The inability of McCarthy to secure the needed votes to be House Speaker — despite six tries at doing so — represents a unique failure on his part. But it has also called into question the extent of Trump’s own power to shape the party in his image, coming at a time when some Republicans have openly soured on his current run for the presidency.
“If these 20 people are successful in exerting their will over the 200 more Republicans who want McCarthy, and deny McCarthy the speakership, then it will be a huge, huge hit against President Trump, because the people who he’s supposed to have the most influence with didn’t listen to him,” said Rodney Davis, the outgoing Republican congressman from Illinois.
The Trump-McCarthy relationship has taken several turns over the years, most often defined by loyalty from the latter toward the former. It was McCarthy who went down to Mar-a-Lago after Jan. 6 to meet with a seemingly exiled Trump and, implicitly, keep him in the fold.
Trump, in turn, has offered his support to McCarthy’s speaker ambitions even as contemporaneous materials surfaced showing the congressman’s frustrations with his presidency. After Republicans took back the House, Trump was in contact with members of the anti-McCarthy wing, publicly expressed his support for McCarthy, and even warned those waging battles against McCarthy that they were setting up a “doomsday scenario” in the House.
