Forty-five House Republicans condemned their eight colleagues who voted to oust Rep. Kevin McCarthy from his speakership, saying that they are “ashamed and embarrassed” by what transpired.
The letter, dated Thursday, was signed by prominent lawmakers such as Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith of Missouri and Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul of Texas. Allies of Mr. McCarthy, including Reps. Garret Graves of Louisiana, Stephanie Bice of Oklahoma and Dusty Johnson of South Dakota, also signed the letter.
The lawmakers called for a “fundamental change to the structure” of the majority because they don’t want the actions of “less than 4 percent of our Republican Conference” to dictate the decisions made.
“We cannot allow our majority to be dictated by the alliance between the chaos caucus and the minority party that will do nothing more than guarantee the failure of our next speaker,” they wrote.
Eight Republicans joined with House Democrats to oust Mr. McCarthy from his speakership Tuesday. While they are not named in the letter, they are Reps. Matt Gaetz of Florida, Andy Biggs of Arizona, Bob Good of Virginia, Matt Rosendale of Montana, Ken Buck of Colorado, Nancy Mace of South Carolina, Tim Burchett of Tennessee, and Eli Crane of Arizona.
The lawmakers called Mr. McCarthy “one of the most accomplished Republican leaders in modern history” who has “tirelessly worked with all factions of our Conference to restore regular order, decentralize decision making, reopen the People’s House, and achieve real results in a divided government on issues ranging from energy independence and combating crime to cutting out-of-control spending and securing our border.”
They also said that when Mr. McCarthy tried to pass a more conservative stopgap measure including border security, seven of the eight hardline Republicans still weren’t happy and voted against it — leaving a clean stopgap measure, that included no Republican policies, to be the only bill that got passed.
Mr. Good was the only Republican to vote to oust Mr. McCarthy and vote for the conservative stopgap bill.
The letter comes in the middle of House Republican turmoil, just days out from removing Mr. McCarthy and days away from a vote to determine a new, more permanent speaker.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan are vying for the position.
• Mallory Wilson can be reached at mwilson@washingtontimes.com.
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