Highlights: Their third speaker pick in three weeks lasted barely four hours. Now, with their desperation on full display, Republicans are trying again.
The House GOP is convening Tuesday night for its fourth internal huddle of the day as it hears from yet another unwieldy field of candidates to lead its broken ranks. No one has demonstrated the ability to do what the three previous failed speaker hopefuls couldn’t: Unite enough Republicans to land 217 votes on the floor.
Two members of tonight’s five-man field have already run and lost. That includes Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.), the second highest vote-getter earlier Tuesday.
There’s little hope for relief among the bitterly divided GOP, where the fruitless search for a speaker has become so miserable that some members even floated a return to former Speaker Kevin McCarthy — with Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) as an “assistant speaker.” (The idea has not been taken seriously inside the conference.)
[M]any Republicans fear they’ve reached the point where no candidate can get 217 votes on the floor.
Is it Britain that has the vote of no confidence thingy? Let’s do that.
What they need is a so-called “constructive vote of no confidence” like in Germany: You cannot just vote one person out, you have to vote a replacement in to remove the old one.
Das a good idea
It’s a feature of a lot of parliamentary systems in general. It’s honestly nice to have the shake up when things are at a standstill in parliament, even if the sometimes constant elections are annoying at times. It also helps to have more than just two viable political parties, also.