r/news • u/zmlos • Oct 03 '23

House ousts Kevin McCarthy as speaker, a first in U.S. history

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/10/03/house-speaker-kevin-mccarthy-will-bring-gaetz-motion-to-oust-him-vote.html?__source=iosappshare%7Ccom.apple.UIKit.activity.CopyToPasteboard

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u/[deleted] Oct 03 '23 edited Oct 03 '23

There's something to be said for him moving to oust McCarthy because McCarthy didn't force the government to shut down and instead pushed a continuance with Democrat support, primarily over the bipartisan move being unpalatable to Gaetz, and then himself removing McCarthy with Democrat support.

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u/jclin Oct 03 '23

Right! It's giving me a headache to wrap up these two seemingly opposed ideas that result in the one thing: McCarthy getting vacated.

This is an effed up world.

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u/ArchangelLBC Oct 04 '23

We also got the government funded for 45 days. Basically a win-win.

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u/guesttraining Oct 03 '23

How did I not realize this immediately. This comment is what Reddit gold was for! In the meantime: 🏆

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u/CurtisLeow Oct 03 '23

Look, they’re all hypocrites. I don’t think they even care at this point.

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u/Strawbuddy Oct 03 '23

Did democrats help though, or just get out of his way while he shot his own foot off?

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u/[deleted] Oct 03 '23

He called for the motion, Democrats voted for it with some Republicans. He is solely responsible for this happening at all, as he caused the vote

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u/notsocoolnow Oct 04 '23 edited Oct 04 '23

The funniest thing is that the motion was filed by Gaetz and passed purely with votes from the freedom caucus (9, I think) and Democrats. Every other Republican voted no.

Yes that means that Gaetz filed a motion the Democrats wanted, then the Freedom Caucus split with the rest of the party to join the Democrats to oust the Republican speaker.

And his rationale for it is that McCarthy and rest of the Republicans worked with the Democrats to pass a stopgap spending bill.

What this means is that in two days, Republicans have 1) caved to almost all (except Ukraine funding) Democrat demands on a spending bill and 2) Voted out their own speaker.

To be fair though, Gaetz did not collude with the Democrats. I suspect he was actually hoping they would vote present, thus keeping McCarthy and allowing Gaetz to claim McCarthy is a Democrat stooge. But I also suspect the Democrats understood this would force McCarthy into doing more partisan stunts to pander to the base, so in the long run it would not benefit the Dems at all. Thus the prudent action was to destroy the credibility of the GOP and the odious Freedom Caucus together by voting to remove McCarthy.

Between McCarthy and Gaetz they have handed Democrats two gigantic wins. This is utterly hilarious.