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These House Republicans say they won't vote for Steve Scalise as House speaker

​​​​​​​View Date:2024-12-23 18:17:56

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, Republican of Louisiana, has won the nomination of his party to be the next House speaker, but must win an election on the House floor to win the office.

If all lawmakers are present and all vote, Scalise can only afford to lose four Republicans out of the 217 in the conference. Democrats are expected to vote against Scalise.

In the secret ballot election held in the GOP conference Wednesday, Scalise won 113, while his opponent, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, won 99. Many of those who supported Jordan have agreed to vote for Scalise on the House floor, but the number who oppose him exceeds the number he can lose.

The vote by the full House was originally scheduled to take place at 3 p.m. Wednesday but has been postponed.

Here are the Republicans who say they will not vote for Scalise:

  1. Rep. Lauren Boebert, of Colorado, tweeted, "I will be voting for Jim Jordan to be Speaker of the House on the floor when the vote is called."
  2. Rep. Michael Cloud, of Texas, tweeted, "While I respect Steve Scalise, the underhanded efforts to rush this vote to the floor without getting full buy-in from the conference is extremely ill-advised and I will not be supporting the nomination on the floor, absent a further discussion."
  3. Rep. Carlos Gimenez, of Florida, said, "I've always said I'm a McCarthy guy so until he says, hey, don't vote for anybody else... 'til he comes to me and says that, I'm voting for McCarthy."
  4. Rep. Bob Good, of Virginia, tweeted: "I am still supporting Jordan. The country cannot afford the status quo."
  5. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, of Georgia tweeted, "Jim Jordan is the fighter we need to be Speaker of the House in this time of national crisis."
  6. Rep. Nancy Mace, of South Carolina, told CNN, "I plan on voting for Jim Jordan on the floor. I've been very vocal about this over the last couple of days." She also explained, "I personally cannot, in good conscience, vote for someone who attended a white supremacist conference and compared himself to David Duke. I would be doing an enormous disservice to the voters I represent in South Carolina if I were to do that." Scalise apologized in 2014 for giving a speech in 2002 to the European-American Unity and Rights Organization (EURO), which was founded by white supremacist and former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke.
  7. Rep. Max Miller, of Ohio, told reporters, "I'm still putting my support behind Jim Jordan for Speaker. I'm not going to change my vote now or anytime soon on the House floor."
  8. Rep. Chip Roy, of Texas, took issue with the attempt to schedule a speedy vote shortly after the conference nominated Scalise. "I will not be voting for @SteveScalise on the floor this afternoon," he tweeted. "The House GOP should NOT have called a vote at 300pm after finishing the vote at 130pm in Conference. That is unacceptable & purposeful."
  9. Rep. Lloyd Smucker, of Pennsylvania, tweeted, "The House GOP Conference is broken. So we oust Kevin McCarthy and all other leaders are rewarded with promotions?... We need to chart a different path forward. In the meantime, I plan to vote for Jim Jordan on the floor." 
  10. Rep. George Santos of New York, tweeted Wednesday night, "It's just past 9:40pm and I have yet to hear from the Speaker-Designate. So I've made my decision and after 10 months and having had 0 contact or outreach from him, I've come to the conclusion that my VOTE doesn't matter to him. I'm now declaring I'm an ANYONE but Scalise and come hell or high water I won't change my mind."

There are also a couple of lawmakers who have not committed to supporting Scalise yet:

  1. Rep. Thomas Massie, of Kentucky, told CBS News, "I'm still very reluctant."
  2. Rep. Mike Turner, of Ohio, told CNN, "He came out with 110 votes; he needs 217. He's going to have to give us a message or understanding of how he's going to bridge that gap."

Alan He, Alejandro Alvarez and Jack Turman contributed to this report.

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