The cliff notes: Steve Scalise does not have the votes.
Clearly, having stood with David Duke and his KKK pals didn’t help Scalise.
There was no new secret ballot held by Republicans today, and nor will there be a floor vote today — probably not tomorrow either.
Important facts about this election for Speaker — Republicans are in charge:
- Weak. Stupid. Unable to govern. The U.S. looks weak and, dare I say, stupid when the shutdown of the House stops all governing decisions from being made. No vote on funds for Ukraine. No vote on funds to help Israel. No vote on the Farm Bill — actually, no effort to even wrestle it into something that looks like a bill. No worries — haha, about whether our government will hit the wall of shutdown again.
- This is a mess. No one has any idea as to who will be Speaker. Clearly, Jordan will not be, and likely, nor will Scalise.
- House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., has unanimous support from Democrats. All he needs is five (5!) more votes, and he could be Speaker. All it takes is 217. Jeffries has 212.
- What’s interesting: Trump gave a strong endorsement to Jordan, and 60% of House Republicans said no to Jordan and no to Trump in the secret ballot. A good activity might be to wonder how long it will take for those secret voting Members to say so in public. It’s time they did.
- Worry. Worry. If some entity were to directly attack the U.S. today, the Republican-held House would be unable to authorize that we defend our country.