Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich blasted a group of five Republicans opposed to Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy becoming speaker Monday, saying their refusal to fall in line will cause “chaos” in the chamber.
”I don’t understand what they’re doing. They’re not voting against Kevin McCarthy, they’re voting against over 215 members of their own conference,” the former congressman from Georgia told “Fox & Friends.”
“Their conference voted overwhelmingly, 85%, for McCarthy to be speaker, so this is a fight between a handful of people and the entire rest of the conference.”
Gingrich, who served as House speaker from 1995 to 1999, was responding to comments earlier Monday by Rep. Bob Good (R-Va.), a member of the so-called “Never Kevin” group.
The 79-year-old Gingrich said the quintet’s only statement in opposing McCarthy was “they have the right to screw up everything.”
“The precedent that sets is … any five people can get up and say, ‘Well, I’m now going to screw up the conference, too.’ The choice is Kevin McCarthy or chaos,” he said.
With less than 24 hours before the full House votes on selecting the next speaker, McCarthy (R-Calif.) appears short of the 218 members he would likely need to win the post.
Gingrich said there is no replacement for McCarthy if his bid for the gavel is blocked “because he has far more people totally dedicated to him than this handful of never-enders.”
“The result is going to be: Anybody who tried to replace Kevin would face total chaos. It will be impossible to govern. So I hope in the next 24 hours that this handful of members will realize they don’t have the moral right to reject the choice of 85% of their conference,” he said, adding that those in opposition are in a “short-sighted position.”
Gingrich pointed out that McCarthy conceded to a demand by members of the House Freedom Caucus to reduce the threshold of members who can initiate a no-confidence vote on the speaker — a process known as a “motion to vacate.”
“You have to say to yourself, if you got somebody to give him everything he asked for, and he still says no, is the problem him and not McCarthy?” Gingrich said about Good, a member of the House Freedom Caucus.
Good insisted that McCarthy has done nothing to “earn my vote.”
”There’s nothing about Kevin McCarthy that indicates that he will bring the change that’s needed to Washington or that’s needed to the Congress, or he’ll bring the fight against the Biden-Schumer agenda and represent the interests of the voters who sent us to Washington to bring real change,” he said.
Good and his four colleagues are separate from nine other Republicans, including three new members who will be sworn in on Tuesday, who released a letter Sunday night professing their opposition to McCarthy and calling for a “radical departure from the status quo — not a continuation of the past, and ongoing, Republican failures.”
