A lawmaker wants to simplify the process as the House GOP struggles to pick a speaker

A Moment of Change: Steve Scalise’s Right-Wing Speaker Vacancies in the House Freedom Caucus Revisited

There were nine Republican representatives who said they would be seeking their conference’s nomination for president ahead of the Sunday deadline.

Steve Scalise was expected to take McCarthy’s place as speaker, but he dropped out after failing to get the necessary support. House Republicans rejected him three times, each by a bigger margin, after Jordan tried to become the party’s nominee.

First, Steve Scalise defeated Mr. Jordan in the secret ballot Republican House conference vote, 113-99, a tally that gave Mr. Jordan about 45 percent of the conference.

This time, a new tool has been added into the mix to ensure the speaker designate, the candidate elected in the initial Tuesday vote, can rally 217 “yeas” on the House floor — the stage that sank previous nominees. Democrats have more members in the House than Republicans.

Flood urged all his peers to join the pledge so that the people’s business can continue.

Prior to a few weeks ago, no member of the House Freedom Caucus had ever been close to becoming speaker. After Jim Jordan’s bid, I wonder whether a right-wing speakership is a matter of when and not if.

Flood told Morning Edition’s Steve InsKEEP on Monday that a majority party is one that votes as a majority. He said that generations of Republicans and Democrats have always chosen a speaker and then voted at the same time on the floor to get that speaker.

Flood said that if we are going to be majority, we need to vote like a majority and find a candidate that will bring us together. “We can find somebody if we use the 222 people we have.”

With the government three weeks away from a possible shutdown, he wants to see who can bring people to the table.

The speaker is expected to deliver votes for the National Defense Authorization Act or the Farm Bill in a month’s time. If you want to work in this job, you need to show that you can move people.

Do We Trust Emmer? The Case for a Better Speaker: How Reply to Trump and Flood Embedded in the First Midterm Primary

Former Alaska gave endorsements to Emmer, who was once a conservative firebrand. Gov. Sarah Palin and Tea Party groups in his bid for governor and Congress.

But he’s taken a more pragmatic approach as a member of the House. NPR’s Domenico Montanaro notes that he’s earned goodwill by running the National Republican Congressional Committee and has risen through the leadership ranks by building relationships, including with Democratic colleagues on his committees.

Trump’s allies don’t trust him because he hasn’t endorsed the former president in the primary or voted to overturn the election.

Pragmatists in the party are looking to elect a leader to return to business, including funding the government and supporting Israel and (to some extent) Ukraine. But hardline Republicans seem to welcome the prospect of a shutdown, Montanaro says — a reflection of the deepening divides in the GOP and the battle over its future.

Flood acknowledges the House GOP has “a lot of problems.” He believes that it can unite again behind a speaker, as it did in January.