Republican U.S. Representative Kevin McCarthy in the House of Representatives, in Washington on January 3, 2023 (AFP/Mandel NGAN)
The elected members of the American House of Representatives must resume their ballot on Wednesday to elect a president, after having failed the day before – a first for a hundred years – during a session marked by strong tensions in the Republican ranks.
Big favorite to replace Nancy Pelosi, the 50-year-old Kevin McCarthy had failed after three successive votes to calm the revolt emanating from a group of Trumpists who consider this elected representative from California too moderate. The elected officials agreed to suspend their votes while negotiating behind the scenes.
The House should resume the vote from midday (5:00 p.m. GMT) and it is not excluded that a new candidate will arise. The last time it took representatives more than one vote to appoint a president was in 1923.
The Republicans, who seized the majority in the lower house in the November elections, had promised to use their new counter-power by opening a series of investigations into US President Joe Biden.
Compositions of the United States House of Representatives and Senate taking office on January 3 and comparison with the compositions of the two outgoing assemblies (AFP / )
But the launch of such hostilities is paralyzed by these internal quarrels: the elected members of the House of Representatives cannot officially take the oath, and therefore open any investigation, as long as a president has not been appointed.
Former Republican President Donald Trump criticized at the end of the day a “superfluous agitation” within a party which he wants to obtain the nomination in order to reconquer the White House in 2024.
– 218 votes –
The election of the “speaker”, the third most important figure in American politics after the president and the vice-president, requires a majority of 218 votes. A threshold that Kevin McCarthy could not reach, twenty elected Trumpists having decided to play the spoilsport.
“It should not be taken personally, but the future of our country depends on it”, assured Chip Roy, turbulent elected official of Texas.
Mr. McCarthy’s candidacy is however widely supported within his party. The announcement of his appointment Tuesday in the hemicycle was received by a great standing ovation in the Republican ranks.
At the start of the third round, some annoyance was beginning to be felt, with the more moderate Republicans urging their colleagues to line up around Kevin McCarthy. “We came here to get things done,” Republican group leader Steve Scalise pleaded, to which Democrats laughed.
Throughout this procedure, Joe Biden’s party has since united around the candidacy of Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, regularly applauding the New York elected official to the sounds of “Hakeem, Hakeem, Hakeem!”.
But the chosen one does not have enough votes to access the perch either.
The election of a Speaker of the House of Representatives could be a matter of a few hours… or several weeks: in 1856, the elected members of Congress only agreed after two months and 133 turns .
Kevin McCarthy seems to want to give pledges to this conservative fringe to prevent history from stuttering: in 2015, he had already narrowly failed to become Speaker of the House of Representatives in the face of a sling from the right wing of the party.
But he can’t afford to go overboard and alienate moderate Republicans.
Although its room for maneuver is reduced, it currently has no credible competitor. Only the name of Ohio elected official Jim Jordan circulates as a possible alternative, without his chances seeming serious.
– Boon for Biden? –
With Republicans in the majority in the House, Joe Biden and the Democrats won’t be able to push through big new projects.
But with a Senate in the hands of the Democrats, neither will their rivals.
US President Joe Biden in early October in Washington (AFP/Nicholas Kamm)
Will they entrench themselves in a systematic opposition? This would require them to come together, while some of their elected officials – as during the vote on the budget before Christmas – voted with the Democrats.
The election of the “speaker” therefore also serves to measure their ability to cause harm to the president.
Facing a hostile House could prove to be a political boon for Joe Biden, if he confirms his intention to run again in 2024 – a decision he is due to announce at the start of the year.
The president was also careful not to comment on the Republican dissensions, his spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre assuring that the Democratic leader would not “meddle in this process”.
In the event of legislative paralysis, he will undoubtedly blame the blocking on weakened Republicans, hoping to turn the situation to his advantage.