Crisis in the US House of Representatives
The next Republican candidate drops out
October 25, 2023, 4:43 a.m
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The US House of Representatives remains leaderless: just a few hours after the Republicans nominate a new candidate, Tom Emmer, for the vote in the plenary session, he withdraws his candidacy again. He also had to expect defeat due to a lack of support within his own ranks.
The crisis in the US House of Representatives, which has been blocked for three weeks, continues to worsen. The third candidate chosen by the Republicans for the presidency of the chamber, Tom Emmer, threw in the towel just a few hours after his nomination, as US media consistently reported. It had previously become clear that the Republican parliamentary group leader had little chance of winning the third-highest state office in the USA in view of internal party resistance.
The representative of the traditional-conservative wing of the party prevailed within the party on Tuesday to succeed Chairman Kevin McCarthy, who was deposed three weeks ago. The number three Republican group received 117 votes in the last round of voting, while second place Mike Johnson received 97 votes.
As a result, 26 MPs signaled that they did not want to support Emmer in the election as chairman in the plenary session. Given the narrow majority of Republicans in the House of Representatives, the representative of the party establishment had no chance of being elected speaker in the plenary session.
Right-wing hardliners accuse Emmer of not sufficiently supporting former President Donald Trump – who then openly spoke out against him. They are also bothered by the fact that the representative from the state of Minnesota has spoken out in favor of aid to Ukraine and gay marriage.
A majority of 217 MPs is required to be elected speaker. The Republicans currently only have a slim majority in the Congressional Chamber with 221 representatives, while President Joe Biden’s Democrats have 212 representatives. The previous chairman, McCarthy, was overthrown on October 3rd by a revolt by right-wing hardliners within his own ranks. The search for a successor is proving to be extremely difficult.
US Chamber is paralyzed
Majority Leader Steve Scalise, initially nominated by the Republicans, withdrew his candidacy after it became clear that he would fall short of the necessary majority. The right-wing hardliner Jim Jordan, who was then nominated, clearly failed in three attempts in the plenary session. The group then withdrew the Trump confidant’s nomination last Friday. Now the 62-year-old Emmer, who has been a member of the House of Representatives since 2015, also failed.
The chaos among the Republicans that has been going on for weeks has far-reaching consequences: without a chairman, the House of Representatives is blocked from passing legislation. This means, among other things, that Congress cannot decide on further military aid for Israel, which has been attacked by the radical Islamic Palestinian organization Hamas, or Ukraine, which has been attacked by Russia, which President Biden has asked Parliament to provide. The USA is also threatened with a so-called shutdown in mid-November without a solution to the budget dispute.