The Fight Over the Speaker of the House

The Journal.

The Wall Street Journal

Business News, Daily News, News

4.2 • 5.8K Ratings

🗓️ 5 January 2023

⏱️ 17 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

For days, the House of Representatives has been at a standstill. A group of conservative lawmakers continues to block Rep. Kevin McCarthy's path to become Speaker of the House. WSJ’s Natalie Andrews explains why some Republicans opposed McCarthy, and what it could take for them to be swayed. Further Reading: -Full Coverage of the Speaker Vote Further Listening: -Why the Red Wave Didn’t Happen Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	For the meeting of the 118 Congress of the United States, the House will come to order.
0:17.0	How would you describe what's happening in Congress right now?
0:20.7	It is chaotic.
0:22.2	It is wild.
0:25.5	That's our colleague Natalie Andrews who covers Congress.
0:29.0	Republicans won control of the House and now they're trying to elect a speaker.
0:33.3	But Kevin McCarthy, the leading candidate, doesn't have enough votes.
0:37.7	By the time we published this episode on Thursday afternoon, he had lost 9 rounds of voting.
0:43.6	So for the past few days, there's been no speaker.
0:47.6	How rare is this situation to not have a speaker of the House?
0:52.1	This is extremely rare.
0:53.6	Surely this vote is a formality it's locked in before even at times when we've seen speaker
0:59.3	struggle to get the votes by the time January has rolled around.
1:02.8	They've taken the questions off the table.
1:06.4	It's been a hundred years since something like this has happened.
1:09.5	And Natalie says, right now, there's no end in sight.
1:16.5	Welcome to the journal, our show about money, business and power.
1:20.5	I'm Ryan Knudsen.
1:22.1	It's Thursday, January 5th.
1:30.0	Coming up on the show, while lawmakers keep voting and voting and voting and not electing
1:37.1	a speaker of the House.
1:49.0	This episode is brought to you by Vonage.
	...

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