House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) is "feeling the heat" and powerless to do his job after waging the political fight of his life to secure it, wrote New York Times editorial board member Michelle Cottle on Monday.
"Having sold his soul and torched his dignity to win his dream gig, the fledgling speaker of the House is struggling to find his groove," wrote Cottle. "Even as the House gears back up after recess, Mr. McCarthy is having relationship troubles with key members of his own team. These notably include Steve Scalise, the majority leader, and Jodey Arrington, who, as chairman of the Budget Committee, is in charge of putting together Republicans’ hotly anticipated spending proposal."
"Indeed, the early report cards for this Congress have been underwhelming, prompting an unflattering assessment of Mr. McCarthy’s tenure compared with those of past Republican speakers such as Newt Gingrich and John Boehner," Cottle continued.
"This conference has managed to pass its top legislative priority, a sprawling energy package that has a snowball’s chance of advancing through the Senate. But, thanks to internecine squabbling, Republicans have had to delay several major measures they had aimed to address early on, including a border security bill and a budget plan. Likewise, their orgy of investigations into all things Biden has had trouble gaining traction. Some Republicans have begun voicing concerns about the conference’s overall focus."
All of this comes at a time when the failure of budget negotiations could very well destabilize the U.S. economy — and it comes as McCarthy "remains disgruntled about his messy speaker’s race, during which, The Times noted, Mr. Arrington reportedly floated Mr. Scalise’s name for the top job," wrote Cottle.
The upshot, she wrote, is that McCarthy's team has made no progress and doesn't have any objectives beyond "thwarting" Democrats.
"Strictly speaking, it isn’t entirely Mr. McCarthy’s fault that his conference is chock-full of MAGA chaos monkeys with zero interest in legislating," Cottle wrote.
"But it is on him that, in scrounging up the votes last winter to become speaker, he made all kinds of concessions to a cadre of those wing nuts. He promised to give priority to their issues, like refusing to raise the debt ceiling without forcing commensurate spending cuts. And he gave them seats on influential committees that increased their negotiating leverage and ability to make mischief. It was as though Mr. McCarthy were trying to engineer the most dysfunctional conference imaginable. Mission accomplished."
