Kevin McCarthy waves the white flag after being ousted as Speaker

| 10:00 pm EDT October 3, 2023
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Kevin McCarthy was ousted as Speaker of the House today because unraveling pariah Matt Gaetz was willing to get a small handful of his fellow bottom feeders to go along with a pointless plan to oust him. This means we’ll have a vote for a new Speaker. Now it turns out at least one name won’t be on the list: Kevin McCarthy.

After McCarthy’s ouster, he announced this evening that he won’t put his name in the ring to try to get reinstated as Speaker. This isn’t a surprise. If Gaetz and the Crazy Eight voted to oust McCarthy, they’re not going to turn around and vote for him as Speaker. All that McCarthy would accomplish by keeping his name in the running is to split the vote and keep Republicans from being able to elect any Speaker.

By waving the white flag, McCarthy has made it slightly easier for House Republicans to end up actually having a Speaker. But it’s still an uphill battle. All it’ll take is five House Republican “no” votes to kill any Speaker candidacy. So if Gaetz and the Crazy Eight want the Speakership to remain vacant for awhile, it will. At least until the House Republicans in toss-up districts start to worry about the blowback costing them reelection, and start thinking about working with House Democrats on a compromise Speaker.

But Kevin McCarthy will be watching that process from the cheap seats. He’s back to being just a regular member of Congress now. Given how horribly these nine months went for him and how humiliatingly he’s fallen, perhaps he’s secretly relieved that he’s no longer in charge of it. But hey, McCarthy went a long way to help Trump survive January 6th. So McCarthy deserves every bad thing that’s happening to him.

Dear Palmer Report readers, we all understand the difficult era we're heading into. Major media outlets are caving to Trump already. Even the internet itself and publishing platforms may be at risk. But Palmer Report is nonetheless going to lead the fight. We're funding our 2025 operating expenses now, so we can keep publishing no matter what happens. I'm asking you to contribute if you can, because the stakes are just so high. You can donate here.