Kevin McCarthy ally Patrick McHenry is appointed temporary Speaker of the House AND Republicans in complete turmoil
- Kevin McCarthy on Tuesday became the first Speaker of the House of Representatives in American history to be voted out of office
- MAGA Republicans, led by Matt Gaetz, led a revolt against McCarthy after McCarthy was perceived to have caved to Democrats’ demands to pass the budget
- Patrick McHenry, a Republican from North Carolina and a McCarthy ally, has been named interim chairman
Kevin McCarthy’s ally Patrick McHenry temporarily took over as speaker of the House of Representatives on Tuesday, after McCarthy became the first speaker in American history to be removed from office.
In January, the controversial McCarthy provided the clerk of the House of Representatives with a secret list of members who could take over temporarily if the office became vacant.
McHenry, a nine-term Republican from North Carolina, appeared to be the first name on McCarthy’s list.
Kevin McCarthy on Tuesday became the first Speaker of the House of Representatives in history to be impeached by his own party
His resignation came at the urging of Matt Gaetz, a Florida Republican and die-hard MAGA loyalist, who felt McCarthy had conceded too much ground to Democrats in the budget debate.
The budget was agreed on Saturday evening, averting an eleventh-hour government shutdown.
Gaetz found support within his own deeply divided party.
The motion to abolish McCarthy, known as vacating the speaker’s chair, passed by a vote of 216 to 210, with eight Republicans joining Democrats.
McHenry currently heads the House Financial Services Committee.
He will be tasked with leading the fractious House in the coming days, but his role is one of the most powerful posts in Congress.
The Speaker of the House of Representatives is also second in the line of succession to the presidency, after the vice president.