Even though I agreed that Kevin McCarthy was a man who I never wanted to be Speaker of the House in the first place, and I was watching with some enthusiasm as Matt Gaetz set the grounds to oust him, I could acknowledge that booting McCarthy without a solid plan wasn't exactly the smartest move in the world.
It hardly makes the cut as one of the dumbest mistakes ever made in D.C., but I digress.
I'm not going to lie. A large part of me gives Gaetz a pass because it was clear that the majority of the Republican Party seemed to be with him on snatching the gavel away from McCarthy. In my honest opinion, it sent a really great message to the Republican Party.
What I didn't anticipate — and probably should have — was the sudden backlash from Republicans that would halt the approval of another person filling the seat. At the very least, I didn't expect this level of resistance. As of now, there are a growing number of Republicans doing their best to make sure Jim Jordan doesn't become Speaker of the House.
I can't help but agree with author and podcast host Steve Deace when he said that the number of Republicans who are resisting Jordan is only growing because every loss emboldens them to defy the people more.
It appears all Gaetz may have done was demonstrate to the swamp we are toothless, and they don’t have to fear us or Trump whatsoever. We can’t deliver the knockout or the nuts. The numbers of those voting against Jordan grow with each round, because they’re feeling safer to…
— Steve Deace (@SteveDeaceShow) October 20, 2023
RedState's Managing Editor Jennifer Van Laar also wrote in her own piece about an elitist attitude that's festering in the heart of the Republican Party that's in total defiance of the people:
Gaetz's motion merely brought fractures within the Republican party from a slow boil to boiling over. Americans are sick of the people in Washington and the pundit class acting like the biggest struggles we're facing are their internal, middle-school-level popularity contests and cliques, and want the actual problems dealt with. Enough of us have made our thoughts known to our representatives that a good number of them are standing up and saying that it's time to vote for Jordan and really get down to work, while others continue to hold an elitist view that they know better than their constituents and have dug in their heels, refusing to vote for Jordan.
The brutal truth is that the Republican Party is currently on fire, but it wasn't Gaetz who lit the match. It was the part of the Party that behaved like Democrat-lite politicians and consistently angered the voting base. All Gaetz did was throw gasoline on a part of the Party that was hitherto protected from it. We could easily put out the fire and begin the real work, but the people who could help stop the fire are standing with their arms folded, letting it all burn because if they can't have control then no one can.
At this point, it's no longer Gaetz's fault there's no Speaker of the House. At one point it was his fault. No longer. Right now, the fault lies with the elitists in the Republican Party who are ready to defy the people in order to exact some sort of shallow revenge for McCarthy's ousting, and choosing Jordan as the focus of their ire.
I think Gaetz understands this, which is why he's willing to take the heat unto himself and the seven who supported him in ousting McCarthy, but I don't think that's going to stop these elitists. It's not about revenge, it's about control.
It's their fault there's no Speaker of the House.
