Tom Emmer dropped his bid to lead the House on Tuesday, just hours after his fellow Republicans nominated him, continuing a partisan fight that has paralyzed Congress for more than three weeks, an aide said.
Emmer, currently third in the House Republican caucus, clinched the nomination after five votes, but was at least 20 votes short of the 217 he needed, according to lawmakers, to “get the president’s gavel.” “.
He abruptly left a meeting where his issue was being discussed, walked past reporters without answering questions, and left the building.
He is the party’s fourth candidate for office who finds himself in the same precarious position as the previous three candidates: trying to win over a small group of dissident Republicans to prevent them from subsequently thwarting his confirmation as president.
“I hope we can find another option,” said Jim Banks, one of those Republicans who previously said he would oppose Emmer in the general vote. “Tom Emmer is not a ‘conservative'”.
Emmer, 62, is known to be more moderate than many other House Republicans. Emmer is considered a strong supporter of helping Ukraine in its war with Russia.
Unlike many members of his party, he voted to certify Democratic President Joe Biden’s victory over Republican Donald Trump in 2020 after a group of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol.
Trump has now said it would be a “tragic mistake” to support the Minnesota representative’s nomination for president.
“He is completely out of touch with Republican voters,” the former president wrote on social media.
Earlier this month, Trump endorsed Republican Rep. Jim Jordan’s bid for president. However, last week, after Jordan lost three votes, members of his party abandoned his candidacy.
Republicans have already rejected two nominations for president, leaving the House leaderless after a small group of Kevin McCarthy’s opponents managed to oust him from office on October 3.
What should be “on a speaker’s resume”?
Emmer might point out that his leadership and fundraising experience is just as useful as speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. First elected in 2014 to represent a suburban Minneapolis district, he helped Republicans win control of the House last year as chairman of their campaign arm.
But leadership skills couldn’t keep Kevin McCarthy from losing his job. His No. 2, Steve Scalise, dropped out of his candidacy just a week later when he couldn’t get enough votes to win the seat.
Neither McCarthy nor Jordan managed to get the 217 Republican votes. Scalise clinched the nomination with 113 votes on October 11, while Jordan received 124 votes in the second nomination vote two days later.
Democrats said they were open to discussing a compromise candidate that would allow the House to function. Many Republicans have said on principle that they will not support someone supported by the opposing party.
Because of all these differences, the House of Representatives did not respond to President Joe Biden’s request for $106 billion in aid for Israel, Ukraine and funds for US border security.
The deadline for Congress to act to fund the US government and avoid a partial shutdown is November 17.
All of this uncertainty has contributed to rising borrowing costs for the US government. The government ran a record deficit of $1.7 trillion last fiscal year, in part due to higher interest payments.
“Washington needs the Republican vote right now. “But we don’t have it,” said Congressman Kelly Armstrong, “and the Republican faction in the US House of Representatives is to blame for this.”
