The majority is split over McCarthy, what does this mean for their Speaker?
McCarthy needs 218 votes to become Speaker, and Republicans hold
222 seats, to 212 for the Democrats. Yet McCarthy could only win 202 votes on the last ballot of the day, while all the Democrats held firm and backed their new leader, Congressman Hakeem Jeffries of Brooklyn.
That’s because a hardcore group of conservative, pro-Trump MAGA Republicans
steadfastly refuses to support McCarthy, even after winning unprecedented
concessions from him. Nineteen of them voted for anyone but McCarthy, eventually
coalescing around Ohio Republican Jim Jordan, who does not want to be
Speaker and is supporting McCarthy. The nineteen House members were joined on the third ballot by another member who had been backing McCarthy but said it’s clear he can’t win.
So the House remains in limbo with no Speaker, unable to conduct any other
business.