Paul Ryan is attaching all sorts of strings to being the Republican savior
House Republicans have all but disintegrated as they try to settle on the next speaker of the House, and it's hurting their party. Paul Ryan, the favored choice after Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy dropped out, is basically sending out the message that he doesn't want the job, but he
might take it if everyone promises to love him and give him what he wants.
It's not exactly clear how it would work for Ryan to get what he wants: The Freedom Caucus, basically founded on the idea of never compromising on anything, is going to suddenly agree to compromise? That's a laugh. But if Ryan doesn't run, it's chaos:
More than a dozen Republicans could make a play for Speaker if Ryan doesn’t run.
The growing list of Speaker wannabes include four powerful Texans: Republican Study Committee Chairman Bill Flores, Rules Committee Chairman Pete Sessions, Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mike McCaul and Agriculture Committee Chairman Mike Conaway.
Others who are putting out feelers are Reps. Lynn Westmoreland (R-Ga.) and Mike Pompeo (R-Kan.), both members of the House Select Benghazi Committee; Reps. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Jim Renacci (R-Ohio); and freshman Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-Mont.), a retired Navy SEAL.
That will not make Republicans more popular. Already,
59 percent of Americans say that the speaker mess is a sign of dysfunction, not of healthy debate within the Republican Party. Weeks of continuing dysfunction won't help that, or the fact that just 24 percent of Americans approve of the job Republicans are doing in Congress.
House Republicans could also lose some of their own over this. It's just talk at this point, but a few so-called moderate House Republicans are hinting they might retire rather than deal with the continuing fallout of the messy speaker fight and some of the scarier people talking about running for the office.
Republicans sure do know how to do dysfunction. Makes sense—they've had so much practice.