On Friday, CNN's Kaitlan Collins reported that GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) tried to put a positive spin on the days of chaos on the House floor in conversation with reporters that afternoon.
"We'll come back tonight and I believe at that time, we'll have the votes to finish this once and for all," McCarthy told reporters, according to Collins. When asked how his caucus can be expected to govern, he said, "Because it took this long, now we learned how to govern."
McCarthy has failed more than a dozen ballots for Speaker since the week began — the first time this has happened in the House since the nineteenth century.
More than 20 Republican members initially refused to back McCarthy, demanding various concessions. After securing a deal with some of the holdouts, McCarthy managed to reduce the number of defectors to just six on the most recent ballot, which is still two short of the number needed to get him the required 218 votes, assuming all Democrats vote against him.
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Several of those remaining, like Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), have made clear they will never back McCarthy for Speaker under any circumstances. But leadership has expressed hope a handful can be peeled off.
Notably, even if McCarthy manages to win over two of the remaining holdouts, he would then immediately face the tough challenge of passing the rules package, which contains a number of concessions McCarthy made to the far-right Freedom Caucus — some of whom were the ones blocking his Speakership — at the expense of more moderate members.
