There are at least 10-20 Republicans who remain unwilling to support Rep. Jim Jordan. They're frustrated over the treatment of Rep. Steve Scalise during his speaker bid and still angry over former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy's ouster.
Rep. Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio, still faces an uphill climb to the House speakership, with at least 10 to 20 Republican members who oppose his nomination, CBS News has learned, based on background conversations over the weekend with six key House Republicans and more than a dozen sources familiar with the deliberations.
"At least 10 to 20," one of the House Republicans told CBS News on Sunday, while another added that that Jordan's support has grown incrementally in recent days but remains soft.
While Jordan's confidants remain optimistic that he can get to the necessary 217 votes Tuesday, when the House is scheduled to bring a vote to the floor, several who are more critical of Jordan privately insisted this weekend that at about a dozen Republicans remain unwilling to support him, due to their frustrations over how Rep. Steve Scalise, Republican of Louisiana, was treated during his speaker bid and their simmering anger over the ouster of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy. They also are wary of whether Jordan can handle the intensity of the challenges facing Congress in the coming months.
I would like a constitutional amendment that says that whenever there is a government shutdown or a deadlock on a vacancy of any constitutional position, each state's members of the congress and the senate draw straws and whoever pulls the short straw loses their capacity to vote or make a quorum on the debt reauthorization or confirmation vote, and their seat goes up for re-election at the end of the current term.