Welcome to the beat. I'm Ari Melville. This Republican chaos is continuing on this Friday night in the House, which just rejected Kevin McCarthy for Speaker again the 13th time. That's two more defeats for McCarthy today.

Kevin McCarthy is pretty much stuck at this point. He can't even stop these votes from taking place and losing over and over again.

House Republicans now

are on the verge of becoming a total clown show if they're not careful. What's it going to take

to get over the top here? We'll get it done tonight. It looks like he will lose on this 13th ballot.

I've got a couple members flying back. That's what it's been looking like as the weekend now looms

on this Friday evening on the East Coast.

It's clear this is one of the worst weeks for any party leader in American history in the last century.

And that includes past speakers who were famously ousted by their own members like Boehner or Gingrich,

but who had at least amassed a coalition first.

The New York Times reports how McCarthy contorted himself as his battle to become speaker

lipped towards a fourth day, a humiliating stretch of consecutive defeats in an election

that's now the most protracted contest since 1859, with McCarthy offering concessions

that could substantially weaken his own authority. And the reporting shows those concessions

include weakening the Speaker's Office by empowering a single member to force a vote to

liquidate his rule the whole thing and put even more of these

rebels in powerful positions, which to many Republicans would look like rewarding the disloyal

behavior. Now, the bruising contest shows McCarthy is still short of the votes he needs, but

today he did bring 14 Republicans back over to supporting his speaker bid.

The House returns for a Friday night session at 10 p.m. tonight, currently in this adjournment.

McCarthy claims momentum.

He claims that he will still find a way to woo some more members, but the math only offers basically two paths.

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