Why McCarthy decided to take on his right flank and prevent the shutdown

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Why McCarthy decided to take on his right flank and prevent the shutdown Speaker Kevin McCarthy didn’t know whether the House could avoid a government shutdown when he met with his divided Republican conference on Saturday morning. But behind closed doors, McCarthy’s unexpected decision to take on his conservative critics quickly came together. After GOP leaders prepared McCarthy’s conference for an indefinite shutdown, his allies grew uneasy. Rep. Bryan Steil took to the mic, comparing a shutdown to a bike ride down a treacherous Bolivian mountain known as “Death Road,” according to sources in the room. If the brakes on your bike fail, Steil said, you are trained to turn into the mountain immediately, because the farther down the mountain you go, the worse the crash will be. The longer you go into a shutdown as a conservative, the Wisconsin Republican argued, the worse conservatives’ options will be.

Transcript

00:00 Speaker Kevin McCarthy didn't know whether the House could avoid a government shutdown

00:04 when he met with his divided Republican conference on Saturday morning.

00:08 But behind closed doors, McCarthy's unexpected decision to take on his conservative critics

00:16 quickly came together. After GOP leaders prepared McCarthy's conference for an indefinite shutdown,

00:23 his allies grew uneasy. Representative Brian Steyl took to the mic,

00:29 comparing a shutdown to a bike ride down a treacherous Bolivian mountain known as Death

00:33 Road, according to sources in the room. "If the brakes on your bike fail," Steyl said,

00:40 "you're trained to turn into the mountain immediately, because the farther down the

00:44 mountain you go, the worse the crash will be." The longer you go into a shutdown as a conservative,

00:51 the Wisconsin Republican argued, the worse conservatives' options will be.

00:56 Then, one by one, vulnerable New York Republicans, Representatives Mike Lawler,

01:02 Mark Molinaro, and Nick LaLotta, spoke in support of a short-term funding bill,

01:08 warning of the political blowback of a shutdown and calling on their colleagues

01:12 to keep the government open. The Speaker was ready to move.

01:16 Turning to his conference, McCarthy asked, "Do we want to jam the Senate?" to loud cheers from

01:24 his allies. McCarthy turned to an aide and asked how quickly they could go to the floor;

01:30 a clean-stopgap bill had already been filed late Friday night.

01:33 "Fifteen minutes," the aide responded. With that, McCarthy took the only option on the table to

01:41 avoid a government shutdown, relying on Democratic votes to pass a continuing resolution Saturday to

01:48 keep the government funded until mid-November. But in so doing, McCarthy opened up a fight with

01:55 the right wing of his conference, which had warned him for weeks that taking this step

01:59 could mean the end of his speakership. Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz told CNN's Jake Tapper on

02:06 "State of the Union Sunday" that he is planning to attempt to oust McCarthy from his role this week.

02:12 "I do intend to file a motion to vacate against Speaker McCarthy this week.

02:18 I think we need to rip off the Band-Aid. I think we need to move on with new leadership that can

02:24 be trustworthy," Gaetz said. McCarthy's 11th-hour decision to put a clean bill on the floor to fund

02:31 the government, without the border policies or deep spending cuts demanded by conservatives,

02:37 marks a new chapter in McCarthy's tenuous relationship with his right flank.

02:43 It's a showdown that has been weeks, if not months, in the making, after a band of rebels

02:48 denied his assent to speakership until after 15 grueling rounds of votes in January.

02:53 McCarthy conveyed to his members that he had exhausted all other options that could pass the

03:00 House, though, in reality, it's been clear for weeks that a continuing resolution with

03:05 the support of Democrats would be the only way to keep the government open.

03:10 After McCarthy moved to a vote on a clean stopgap funding bill,

03:14 which included additional funds for disaster relief but not for Ukraine aid, the measure

03:20 quickly cleared both the House and Senate with big bipartisan majorities before the government

03:25 was set to shut down at midnight. The House's move to avoid a shutdown was a surprising change

03:31 of course for McCarthy, who had been eager to avoid the showdown with his critics.

03:37 But now, knowing full well he's likely to soon face a so-called motion to vacate vote,

03:43 McCarthy is taking his detractors head on, and in increasingly combative terms.

03:48 "If somebody wants to make a motion against me, bring it," McCarthy said at a news conference

03:55 after the House approved the stopgap measure. "There has to be an adult in the room.

04:00 I am going to govern with what's best for this country."

04:05 McCarthy's loudest critics are determined to oust him as speaker and are strategizing over how

04:11 and when to make their move. But sources close to the rebels say they want to build opposition

04:17 and get the numbers on their side before they force a snap vote.

04:21 Gates continued to slam the speaker's leadership Saturday.

04:25 "There's nothing about delaying this process that is being the adult in the room," he said.

04:32 We are at this point because Kevin McCarthy made multiple contradictory promises about the budget

04:38 top line to different groups of people. In recent days, Gates has been reaching out to Democrats to

04:44 gauge where they stand in making his sales pitch about who he sees as a replacement for the job,

04:50 floating names such as veteran GOP Representative Tom Cole and House GOP Whip Tom Emmer.

04:58 Gates knows he will likely need most, if not all, Democrats on his side to succeed.

05:03 The earliest McCarthy's critics could start the process to oust him is Monday,

05:09 when the House will be back in session.

05:11 For House Democrats, it took a little bit of time Saturday, along with the pulling of a fire alarm

05:18 in a House office building, but they ultimately chose to join Republicans to pass the stopgap

05:24 funding measure. That doesn't mean, of course, that they intend to help McCarthy keep his job

05:30 as speaker. House Democratic leaders said in a statement s.

05:35 "By Saturday morning, it wasn't exactly clear where they'd end up," two sources said.

05:41 Leadership knew what was possible, but McCarthy wanted his members to have buy-in.

05:48 One GOP lawmaker told CNN that McCarthy knew he had to demonstrate he could not pass a bill with

05:54 Republican votes before reverting to a bipartisan solution.

05:58 "You have to exhaust all options before doing the right thing," the lawmaker said.

06:03 That way, the speaker gave less ammunition to his critics chomping at the bit to oust him.

06:10 "He hung with the exotics until they left a vast majority with no options," the lawmaker said.

06:17 The stopgap funding measure was filed at 11.52 p.m. Friday, meaning McCarthy had the bill in

06:24 his back pocket, even if he didn't telegraph where he was going until the last possible second.

06:29 Initially, McCarthy's team had briefed his conference on potential bills to vote on

06:35 Saturday that could blunt the impact of a shutdown, such as ensuring pay for military

06:41 service members or Border Patrol agents. Some lawmakers responded that other important

06:47 constituents could go unpaid, which could lead to backlash.

06:51 "We walked into the conference, and I think there was a large number of us that wanted

06:57 to make sure we kept the federal government open and operational," Steyl said Saturday evening.

07:02 But that was not a unanimous view in the conference, and it was making sure people

07:08 understood that the stopgap measure that passed today was the best option amongst a series of

07:13 bad options. Some of McCarthy's allies were surprised that the meeting didn't start by

07:19 making a final pitch to vote for a short-term funding bill, but noted the tactic helped get

07:24 them there in the end. So either the strategy changed as a result of the comments made during

07:30 open mic, or it was a strategy all along to end up there, but don't make that your first offer

07:36 and let the crowd influence that decision, Arkansas GOP Representative Steve Womack,

07:42 a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, told CNN.

07:46 Conservative Anger Bubbling

07:49 The conservative hardliners in the GOP conference were dismayed at McCarthy's maneuver to keep the

07:56 government open. Several blasted the speaker after Saturday's vote, though they declined to say yet

08:02 whether they were ready to oust McCarthy. GOP Representative Ralph Norman of South Carolina

08:09 would not say whether he has confidence in the speaker, though he said he was disappointed by

08:14 McCarthy. "I'm disappointed. I wish we had fought. We just didn't fight," he said. "Very disappointing.

08:24 Spending as usual up here. No border control."

08:29 Asked whether McCarthy should still be speaker, Norman said, "Time will tell."

08:35 He also would not say whether he would vote for a motion to vacate. "We've got our hands full.

08:40 We'll see what he does."

08:42 Representative Andy Biggs, an Arizona Republican, wrote that instead of siding with his own party,

08:50 McCarthy sided with 209 Democrats to pass the stopgap bill.

08:55 Should he remain speaker of the House?

08:58 Biggs posted on X, the site formerly known as Twitter.

09:04 McCarthy's allies have also been gearing up for the fight over the speakership,

09:08 cognizant of the chaos that afflicted the House in the opening days of the 118th Congress

09:14 when it took 15 votes for McCarthy to win the speakership.

09:17 "They can threaten and they can file. Kevin is well aware what doing the right thing for

09:24 our country today meant," said one Republican allied with McCarthy. "We need to work through

09:30 this. Not sure of exact play, but options are available."

09:34 Some McCarthy allies have suggested they should just force the vote themselves and call Gates'

09:41 bluff, in order to neuter the threat. "I heard some hint at this. I don't like playing games,

09:48 but we can't be held hostage by these threats," said Rep. Don Bacon, a Nebraska Republican.

09:54 "If he does the motion, then we need to hit head-on and win."

10:00 "We need to point out that he offers no alternative, just nihilism."

10:04 Gates' threat of ousting McCarthy has also rankled some inside the GOP conference.

10:10 One Republican lawmaker pointed to the ongoing Ethics Committee investigation into Gates,

10:17 warning if he wasn't cleared, he could get expelled by those who want him gone.

10:21 "We want him out," the member said.

10:24 Senate Republicans Step In

10:28 The delicate interplay between House and Senate Republicans became integral to McCarthy's plan,

10:35 with a close friend and former House member, Sen. Mark Wayne Mullen of Oklahoma,

10:40 playing the role of chamber-to-chamber interpreter.

10:42 Mullen attended the House conference meeting Saturday morning, answering questions about

10:48 what was and was not possible, both politically and procedurally, in the Senate.

10:55 But the coordination didn't end there. Republican Senate Whip John Thune was also in regular

11:01 communication with the Speaker and in consultation with Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell

11:06 throughout the week. On Saturday, after McCarthy announced he was moving ahead with a plan to put

11:13 a continuing resolution on the floor, Thune and McCarthy chatted again with the Republican Whip,

11:20 providing a gut check of what could play out on.

11:22 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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