President Biden declined Friday to pick a favorite in the race to become the new House speaker, saying he has no choice but to work with whoever lands the post.
“Whomever the House speaker is, I’m going to try to work with. They control half of the Congress and I’m going to try to work with them,” Mr. Biden said after remarks about the economy. “Some people I imagine will be easier to work with than others, but whomever the speaker is, I’ll try to work with them.”
Mr. Biden declined to answer questions about whether he thought he could work with Rep. Jim Jordan, Ohio Republican, whose bid for the speaker’s gavel received a big boost Friday with an endorsement from former President Donald Trump.
Mr. Jordan, who is chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and a co-founder of the House Freedom Caucus, is one of Mr. Biden’s fiercest critics in Congress, and the pressure of the high-profile speaker position could increase already inflamed tensions between the two men.
Since former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, California Republican, was ousted this week, Mr. Biden has largely stayed out of the chaos that has consumed Capitol Hill.
In a speech Wednesday, the president called on Congress to change the “poisonous atmosphere in Washington” and urged lawmakers to come together to support Ukraine funding.
“More than anything, we need to change the poisonous atmosphere in Washington. You know, we have strong disagreements, but we need to stop seeing each other as enemies. We need to talk to one another, listen to one another, work with one another. And we can do that,” Mr. Biden said, while acknowledging there is a lot of work for the House to do.
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.
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