Steve Scalise: I wouldn’t run against Kevin McCarthy in race to replace Paul Ryan

House Majority Whip Steve Scalise on Thursday said he wouldn’t challenge Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy in a GOP leadership contest to replace outgoing Speaker Paul D. Ryan.

Mr. Ryan also rejected the notion that he should step aside earlier than planned and clear the way for a quick transition to a successor, saying his fundraising prowess is needed during what’s shaping up to be a tough election year for Republicans. He announced Wednesday he will leave Congress early next year at the end of his term.

But Mr. Scalise on Thursday reiterated recent public comments saying that if Mr. McCarthy does jump into the race for speaker, he won’t directly challenge him.

“No, and I’ve said that before. I’ve never run against Kevin and wouldn’t run against Kevin,” Mr. Scalise, Louisiana Republican, said on Fox News. “He and I are good friends.”

Mr. McCarthy and Mr. Scalise, the No. 2 and No. 3-ranking Republicans in the House respectively, are seen as the most likely successors to Mr. Ryan.

For now, both men say Republicans need to be focused on making sure that the GOP keeps their tenuous House majority.

“What means [the] most to me is that in the next Congress there is an opportunity for a Republican to be speaker and not Nancy Pelosi,” Mr. McCarthy, California Republican, said on Fox.

Mr. Ryan said he was encouraged by Mr. Scalise’s comments, saying they’re an indication that the GOP leadership team is intact and headed in the right direction.

“I was encouraged that Steve Scalise this morning said that he thinks after the election that Kevin McCarthy ought to be the person to replace me,” Mr. Ryan said at his weekly news conference.

Mr. Scalise’s office said the sentiment isn’t any different from other recent comments in which the Louisiana Republican indicated that he doesn’t plan to challenge Mr. McCarthy for speaker.

But Mr. Ryan himself has pointed out multiple times that he originally didn’t want the job in 2015 after former Speaker John A. Boehner decided to retire.

Indeed, it was Mr. McCarthy who withdrew from the leadership race then, saying Republicans probably needed a “fresh face” to unite them.

Mr. McCarthy’s surprise withdrawal led members to try to draft the initially reluctant Mr. Ryan into running for the job.

Mr. McCarthy, a former GOP whip, moved into his current post after former Majority Leader Eric Cantor unexpectedly lost to Rep. Dave Brat in a Virginia GOP primary contest in June 2014.

Mr. Cantor ended up resigning from Congress in August 2014, but Mr. Ryan on Thursday waved aside talk that he could step aside early, saying the party needs his fundraising prowess heading into the fall.

“It’s obviously in our interest to keeping our majority that every player is on the field fighting for this majority, raising for this majority, and it makes no sense to take the biggest fundraiser off the field,” he said.

The Congressional Leadership Fund, a Ryan-aligned super PAC, credited the speaker for what’s shaping up to be a record-breaking fundraising cycle.

“Thanks to Paul Ryan, the Congressional Leadership Fund has already raised nearly $50 million this cycle and is on pace to have its best cycle in history,” said Corry Bliss, the group’s executive director.

But some Republicans have speculated that Mr. Ryan’s lame duck status would lessen his fundraising appeal going forward, and that a protracted leadership fight could become a distraction heading into the fall elections.

“I would think people who want to give money are going to want to talk to the person who’s going to be speaker,” said Rep. Thomas Massie, Kentucky Republican.

Mr. McCarthy and Mr. Scalise have both shown signs that they’d be ready to step in on that front.

The majority leader raised $8.75 million in the first quarter and has done fundraisers for 40 GOP candidates, a person familiar with his political operation told The Associated Press.

Mr. Scalise’s team, meanwhile, announced Thursday that he has raised $3 million in the first quarter — a record for a whip in the first three months of an election year — while hosting nearly 50 events and transferring more than $1 million to the House GOP’s campaign arm.