McCarthy fails for third long day in GOP House Speaker fight

WASHINGTON (AP):

For a long and frustrating third day, divided Republicans left the Speaker’s chair of the US House sitting empty Thursday, as party leader Kevin McCarthy failed and failed again in an excruciating string of ballots to win enough GOP votes to seize the chamber’s gavel.

Pressure was building as McCarthy lost a seventh, eighth and historic ninth round of voting, tying the number it took the last time this happened, 100 years ago, in a prolonged fight to choose a Speaker in a disputed election.

With his supporters and foes locked in stalemate, feelings of boredom and desperation seemed increasingly evident with no end in sight. Nevertheless, a 10th vote was launched.

One McCarthy critic, Matt Gaetz of Florida, cast votes in two rounds for Donald Trump, a symbolic but pointed sign of the broader divisions over the Republican Party’s future.

“It’s not happening,” said Lauren Boebert of Colorado who nominated a new alternative, Kevin Hern of Oklahoma, and urged fellow Republicans to embrace a future without McCarthy: “We need a leader who is not of the broken system.”

McCarthy could be seen talking, one on one, in whispered and animated conversations in the House chamber, and met privately earlier with colleagues determined to persuade Republican holdouts to end the paralysing debate that has blighted his new GOP majority.

“We’re having good discussions and I think everyone wants to find a solution,” McCarthy told reporters shortly before the House gavelled in its third session.

The House, which is one-half of Congress, is essentially at a standstill, unable to launch the new session, swear in elected members and conduct official business.

Yet, despite endless talks, signs of concessions and a public spectacle unlike any other in recent political memory, the path ahead remained highly uncertain. What started as a political novelty, the first time since 1923 a nominee had not won the gavel on the first vote, has devolved into a bitter Republican Party feud and deepening potential crisis.

Democrat Hakeem Jeffries of New York was re-nominated by Democrats. He won the most votes on every ballot but also remained short of a majority. McCarthy ran second, gaining no ground.

McCarthy resisted under growing pressure to somehow find the votes he needed or step aside so the House could open fully and get on with the business of governing.