Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The republican ‘Pastor’ of the House is an odious authoritarian little creep.

“In the future, this lab will be a museum. do not touch it.”

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

President Musk and Trump are both poorly raised, coddled 8 year old boys.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

It is possible to do the right thing without the promise of a cookie.

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

The unpunished coup was a training exercise.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

When you’re in more danger from the IDF than from Russian shelling, that’s really bad.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

Giving in to doom is how we fail to fight for ourselves & one another.

The real work of an opposition party is to oppose.

This must be what justice looks like, not vengeful, just peaceful exuberance.

When we show up, we win.

Hey Washington Post, “Democracy Dies in Darkness” was supposed to be a warning, not a mission statement.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Speaker Mike Johnson is a vile traitor to the House and the Constitution.

The desire to stay informed is directly at odds with the need to not be constantly enraged.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

People are complicated. Love is not.

You are here: Home / Economics / Grifters Gonna Grift / Tuesday Night Open Thread: Nancy Mace’s Scarlet Letter

Tuesday Night Open Thread: Nancy Mace’s Scarlet Letter

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It stands for Attention… seeker (in lieu of a coarser noun). Nancy Mace is GOING places, and she doesn’t care about collateral damage, just as long as she’s getting that sweet, intoxicating ATTENTION!

Per the estimable Charles P. Pierce, at Esquire, “Rep. Nancy Mace Is on a Tourist Visa to MAGAland”:

… In not quite two terms in the House, Mace already has amassed an impressive career as a flea on a griddle. In 2022, she didn’t vote to impeach the former president*, but she did criticize him on TV, which was enough to get him to endorse a primary challenge to Mace, which failed. Since then, Mace has exercised a kind of tourist visa to MAGAland. She endorsed a criminal referral against Steve Bannon. In January, she landed all over Gaetz when he agitated against McCarthy’s re-election as speaker. Then, over the last week, she’s joined with Gaetz in defenestrating McCarthy, and then she appeared with him on Steve Bannon’s podcast to celebrate the historic moment. This could be called playing both ends against the middle, except there is no middle to the Republican caucus in the House. This act has grown old to her colleagues. From Politico:

... McCarthy and Mace didn’t always see eye to eye, but the California Republican had helped Mace secure her seat in Congress by pumping millions of dollars into her once-struggling campaign. Mace’s move to aggressively fundraise off her vote to bounce McCarthy is only intensifying her colleagues’ anger toward her. “It’s disgraceful,” said Rep. Steve Womack (R-Ark.), a longtime McCarthy ally. “If the purpose is because it’s going to help me build my brand and gonna bring a little bit more money to my campaign,” Womack added of Mace, “then I think you need to question why you’re here.”

After whipsawing between distance from and embrace of former President Donald Trump, for example, she recently opened the door to backing his primary campaign. Within the Capitol, she’s known as an outspoken critic of party leadership and a frequent guest on cable news shows. “I’m not sure what the fallout will be. She has no coalition of support,” said one House GOP lawmaker, who was granted anonymity to discuss internal party dynamics. “I can’t stop her from going on the Sunday shows,” this lawmaker added. “But inside the conference, she is a running joke.”…

Reader Interactions

82Comments

  5. 5.

    Scout211

    On the Gym Jordan topic, Former Ohio State University wrestlers say Jim Jordan betrayed them and shouldn’t be House speaker

    Four of the former Ohio State University wrestlers who have accused Rep. Jim Jordan of failing to protect them from a sexual predatorwhen he was the team’s assistant coach in the 1980s and ’90s said Tuesday he has no business being the next speaker of the House.

    “Do you really want a guy in that job who chose not to stand up for his guys?” said former OSU wrestler Mike Schyck, one of the hundreds of former athletes and students who say they were sexually abused by school doctor Richard Strauss and have sued the university. “Is that the kind of character trait you want for a House speaker?”

    The wrestlers’ decisions to weigh in adds a new dimension to the speaker race, bringing in a controversial part of Jordan’s past that continues to hang over the Ohio Republican and staunch ally of former President Donald Trump.

    So far, the OSU affair hasn’t received much focus — one GOP congresswoman recently said she wasn’t even aware of the allegations — but it could continue to follow Jordan. Even if he becomes speaker, there’s a chance he could be deposed in one of the lawsuits.

    I hope people talk about this all the time and I applaud these men for speaking up right now.

    Edited for clarity.

  7. 7.

    scav

    Give her 25 more months and some solid tutoring, and she may assemble the whole alphabet.  Too bad she forgot to wear her graduation cap so that people had to ask what she was parading around about.

  10. 10.

    Scout211

    @opiejeanne: Neither she nor any of her staff read “The Scarlet Letter”.

    Maybe not.  Probably not, but the reporters seems to think so. Link

    Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) was spotted wearing a white T-shirt with a red letter “A” on it as she entered a closed doors candidate forum with the two contenders for Speaker of the House, Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) and Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH). The shirt is an apparent reference to the 1850 novel, The Scarlet Letter, where protagonist Hester Prynne is condemned for giving birth despite not being married and is subsequently forced to wear a scarlet A for the rest of her life. When asked about what the letter stood for, Mace said: “I’m wearing the scarlet letter after the week I just had being a woman up here, and being demonized for my vote and for my voice.” Mace garnered backlash from many of her Republican colleagues after voting to oust Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) from his role as House Speaker. Her vote came as a shock after McCarthy donated millions of dollars to Mace’s campaign. She has publicly supported Jim Jordan as the next speaker and announced that she plans to vote for him.

  11. 11.

    Barbara

    Evidently she is too stupid to come up with something that makes her sound marginally less stupid than an outright denial that she knows anything about sexual abuse allegations involving the OSU wrestling team.

    @Scout211: I can only imagine what Jordan promised her, but I figure she’s on her own now for fundraising.

  12. 12.

    HumboldtBlue

    @West of the Rockies: ​ 

    I think she fills up a suit just fine, she’s just a striving, grasping wholly dishonest and apparently soulless human being. She’s got that pageant girl smile down pat, though.

  13. 13.

    denimull

    Is…is she…uhm, trying to become the GOP version of Sinema (minus the voting against her party’s platform)? She not read the room on that choice?

  14. 14.

    dmsilev

    But inside the conference, she is a running joke.”…

    Considering the curve that she’s being graded upon in that comparison, that’s actually quite impressive.

  16. 16.

    karen marie

    @Barbara: My question is, was there any follow-up?

    I think I can answer without having seen any of it. No.

    Mace is a troll but whoever the media person was, they’re as bad, if not worse than Mace.

  17. 17.

    Another Scott

    Meanwhile, one for Albatrossity… Science.org:

    Given that the wandering albatross can weigh more than a 2-year-old child, it has some heavy lifting to do as it flies over vast swaths of open ocean. Finding good air currents can help, and these birds may search for them by listening for sounds that humans can’t hear. Researchers tracking the paths of these long-distance fliers report today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that the very low frequency noise made by clashing waves influences the birds’ headings. The species joins a small but growing list of animals—including elephants, prairie dogs, and homing pigeons—that make use of such “infrasounds.”

    The work is “of substantial significance,” says Tim Guilford, a zoologist at the University of Oxford who was not involved in the research. The technology used to reach these conclusions is “part of a new era in [the] study of animal behavior and ecology.”

    Researchers have long wondered how wandering albatrosses (Diomedea exulans), which can fly more than 10,000 kilometers over open ocean in a single trip, make these journeys. Finding the right wind conditions, such as updrafts, to soar rather than flapping their wings, is key to conserving energy. Large waves can help generate those critical wind conditions, and may provide the birds with a sonic hint to their presence.

    Big waves produce a very low frequency sound, below 20 hertz and beyond the limits of human hearing, that can travel thousands of kilometers, particularly when they collide with long distance swells, such as when storms develop. Samantha Patrick, an ecologist at the University of Liverpool was curious about whether the birds could key into these infrasounds—the “voice of the sea,” she calls it—to find the perfect wind.

    […]

    Neato.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  19. 19.

    patrick II

    I lead a very young and recent graduate english teacher my sophomore year of high school. She Was just 22 years old. We were studying ” the Scarlet Letter” for an entire 6 week period. About 3 weeks in some one noticed she had never said what the “A” stood for. So the one of the braver the guys asked. She turned bright red and changed the subject. Times have changed.​​

  20. 20.

    opiejeanne

    @patrick II: Not really.  Really?

    Yes, it starts out meaning adulterer, but by the book’s end it stands for “ability” because of what she does with her life.

    And the pastor who is the father of the child was a coward.

  21. 21.

    Geminid

    Mace had to make moderate noises when she ran against Joe Cunningham in 2020. Cunningham had flipped the South Carolina 1st CD* in the 2018 Democratic wave, and it was thought to be a purple district. So Mace wowed journalists with purple prose and they tagged her as a “moderate” She’s really more of a chameleon though, and when redistricting turned the 1st CD redder she changed color with it.

    * Joe Cunninham probably would not have beaten the incumbent in 2018, but Mark Sanford got knocked out in the primary by a Tea Party crank. The district’s Range Rover Republicans rejected the loonie lady and swung to Cunninham. Then they swung back to “Moderate” Mace in 2020.

  22. 22.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Geminid: as I recall, she made some mouth noises about impeachment in the hours/days after January 7, but retreated by the time any votes were cast. Then made her infamous groveling pilgrimage to trump tower (If memory serves, The Beast was in Florida while she filmed her video on 5th Ave)

  23. 23.

    sdhays

    I’m glad the other 7 not-Matt-Gaetz’s are getting their time in focus. The Motion to Vacate being able to be called by one member isn’t really a big deal if it’s just one crank. Matt Gaetz was upset and it was personal. What were the other shits’ excuses?

    No party has a majority in the House of Representatives. There is the Awful Republican minority, the Democratic minority, and a small Republican Independent Dipshits Caucus who are sooo Awfully Republican that they can’t get along with any other Awful Republicans.

  24. 24.

    Kent

    With Republicans, every accusation is always a confession.

    She is already on her 3rd husband so we know there must have been some adultery there in her past.  But who is she screwing NOW?  Inquiring minds want to know!

  25. 25.

    opiejeanne

    @patrick II: We were given The Scarlet Letter in Junior year the same day that the school musical was announced while we were in that English class, my best friend and I turned to each other and sang, “I hope, and I pray, for Hester to get just one more A”, and then we laughed like loons.

    The rest of the class thought we were just nuts, but the mystery of what that line meant in the song was finally solved for both of us. I mean, neither her parents or mine understood what the line from The Music Man meant.

  26. 26.

    Alison Rose

    @opiejeanne: They might’ve meant she wasn’t married to the father of the child. I wouldn’t call him a coward. They were both living under severe and unforgiving restraints of the time and place. He certainly takes himself to task for it, physically.

  27. 27.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Ken Buck, whom I have always thought of as a troglodyte, is one of The Gaetz Eight (sorry), but he seems to be (the?) one who is not like the others

    Olivia Beavers @Olivia_Beavers 2h
    Newsy Nugget: In the candidate forum, Rep. Ken Buck asked both Scalise and Jordan if Trump won or lost the last election, per sources. Multiple House Rs felt both equivocated. One said both “tried to have it both ways.” They argued how some states changed their laws bc covid…

    and some GOP members thought they insinuated Trump lost bc of how states had changed their election practices. I’m told Rep. French Hill then stood & tried to follow up and push for a direct answer but wasn’t successful. One said centrist looked quite displeased by it all.

  28. 28.

    laura

    A Fame Whore says what?, as she strides down the hallway to claim the coveted “Queen of the High School Girl’s Bathroom” award.

  30. 30.

    Another Scott

    RollCall.com:

    “Even though I’m the eternal optimist, I don’t see us getting to a speaker tomorrow,” said Florida Rep. Kat Cammack. “There really has not been a clear path for either candidate.”

    And that path could be made more difficult under a proposed change to conference rules offered Tuesday by Texas Rep. Chip Roy. Instead of the conference electing its leader through a simple majority vote, Roy’s rule would require a candidate to amass at least 217 votes — just four shy of the total number of GOP members.

    If candidates fail to reach 217 votes but they receive at least 185 votes, they would be subjected to additional rounds of questioning from the conference, which would then vote again. And if candidates fail to obtain at least 185 votes, the entire nominating process would restart.

    A discussion of the proposed rule change was expected to be held Wednesday. “I think we are going to have a serious conversation about how we ensure that we have 218 behind that individual on the floor, and that’s what we’re going to debate tomorrow,” Roy said.

    Supporters of the rule change said the move would ensure GOP unity before bringing a nomination to the House floor, where Republicans govern by a razor-thin margin.

    Heh. “Unity”. The bomb-throwers don’t want unity. They want to throw bombs.

    It looks to be a long few weeks, but we’ll see.

    Grr…,
    Scott.

  31. 31.

    Ken

    @Another Scott: My expectation if they adopt the rule is that they spend the rest of the week holding their secret in-conference votes, with no one reaching the threshold. However my expectation if they don’t adopt the rule is that the same thing happens, with the in-public votes on the floor of the House. So I’ll predict they adopt it, because although they have no shame, they do still feel embarrassment.

  34. 34.

    dmsilev

    @Another Scott: Maybe they should adopt Survivor voting rules, and after each round, pick a Representative who gets exiled from the tribe. Pretty sure Matt Gaetz would be the first one defenestrated, and I’m not entirely sure that I’m being metaphorical.

  35. 35.

    C Stars

    I just can’t get over this story about another exemplary Republican. Santos stole his own donors’ credit card info and then made tens of thousands of unauthorized charges. One donor’s card was charged $45k by the campaign. Of course, he was also funneling some of this money into his personal accounts. How is he not in jail?

     

    Gift link:

    https://wapo.st/3FiwU8Z

     

    ETA Oh shoot, just saw there was already a post about this. That kind of day. And that kind of political party, I guess.

  37. 37.

    Mike in NC

    South Carolina seldom sends their best into politics. Mace will hope to replace Kari Lake as Fat Bastard’s VP selection.

  39. 39.

    wjca

    @C Stars: How is he [Santos] not in jail?

    White collar crimes like this take a while to investigate.

    In other crimes, the bulk of the evidence is often in before the perpetrator is identified.  So once you know who, you can arrest him and be ready to go to trial.  With white collar crimes, you generally know who did it well before you have gathered all the evidence necessary to get a conviction.

    All that said, Santos will go down.  Possibly not before he loses his reelection bid (although it sounds like the DA is getting close).  But down in flames.

  40. 40.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Scout211: Then the reporters haven’t read it either.  Hester was married, but her husband was absent (presumed lost at sea IIRC).  FFS

    Also, if she is Hester Prynne, who is Rev. Dimmesdale in this version?

  43. 43.

    C Stars

     

    @wjca: Santos will go down.  Possibly not before he loses his reelection bid (although it sounds like the DA is getting close).  But down in flames.

    Glad to get confirmation on that. My confidence in very bad people getting their commupance has been shaken lately.

  44. 44.

    NotMax

    @mrmoshpotato

    “Why don’t they pass a Constitutional Amendment prohibiting anybody from learning anything? If it works as good as Prohibition did, in five years we will have the smartest people on earth.”
    – Will Rogers
    ;)

  46. 46.

    piratedan

    isn’t she just the gender equivalent of the former Squeaker of the House?  Willing to say whatever she needs to say to please whatever audience is in front of her… the press corpse… she’s miss mary moderate… in front of the MAGA types, she’s Marj Greene’s kid sister, in front of the soccer Mom’s she concerned about abortions being available to their teenage and college daughters… in front of their dads, she shows them some cleavage and a tight ass hugging skirt.

    Maybe SC will wise up, but they keep sending Tim Scott and Lindsey Graham back to office, so I won’t raise my hopes too much.

  47. 47.

    wjca

    @C Stars: My confidence in very bad people getting their commupance has been shaken lately.

    Santos doesn’t rank as “very bad”.  A two bit crook is more like it.  Very bad people, especially rich ones, can get top lawyers and accountants to help them dodge the law for a long time.  Santos, we can easily see already, has neither.  Nor the brains to conceal his misdeeds himself.

  48. 48.

    Shalimar

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: others can correct me on Ken Buck if I’m mistaken.  I have not followed him closely.  My impression is that Buck is a far-right extremist but one of the few who actually believe what they’re saying instead of just saying outrageous shit for attention and to be a troll.  So he’s a bit more consistent than most of them.

  49. 49.

    billcinsd

    @Kent: But who is she screwing NOW?  Inquiring minds want to know!

    I believe she lives with her current fiancé. She made a joke about it at a recent Republican prayer breakfast.

  50. 50.

    patrick II

    @opiejeanne:

    I didn’t know that the A turned out standing for “ability”, but it’s not my fault — Ms. Scott would never tell us.  Besides, it was 1964 and I probably wouldn’t remember if she didd.

  51. 51.

    opiejeanne

    @patrick II: It was 1967 for us, and we had a teacher fresh out of school* too, but she did point out that the town’s attitude about Hester gradually changed and she earned their respect by working as a caregiver.

     

    *She wasn’t much help with the other books we were assigned but that one she did well with.

  56. 56.

    Anne Laurie

    @opiejeanne: To be fair, I think she may have intended a kind of callback to her *scandalous* behavior back last summer, when she told the unsympathetic attendees at the National Prayer Breakfast  she’d turned down a morning quickie with her fiance so that she wouldn’t be late (for the cameras).

    An unmarried woman, admitting to having sex, and worse, enjoying it  — the horror!!!

    I assumed at the time she picked her audience for maximum publicity, but for some reason (there was a lot going on at the time, as is the fashion these days), the public attention died too quickly for her Scarlet Woman joke.  So, maybe she already had the t-shirt printed up when this latest ‘scandal’ broke?

  57. 57.

    Anne Laurie

    @Mike in NC: Mace will hope to replace Kari Lake as Fat Bastard’s VP selection.

    Elise Stefanick has made it clear that Mace will only do so over her dead body.  Mace’s dead body, that is.

  59. 59.

    Mai Naem mobile

    I kind of would like to see Qevin back as Speaker. There is entertainment value in watching him pull his retribution stuff on Gaetz, Mace, Biggs and all the others . To be fair there’s great entertainment value in watching Gym Jordan run the House because he’s a clueless twit. I really want every GOP Rep asked if George Santos should resign. Same question repeated over and over.

  62. 62.

    Geminid

    @Mai Naem mobile: As a practical matter, I think a Speaker Jordan would probably be no better and no worse than Kevin McCarthy on most legislative issues. Aid to Ukraine could be an exception in that Jordan might set up more roadblocks than McCarthy would. But there is a solid majority for aid in the House as a whole, and with the Senate on board I think an aid bill will be passed one way or another.

    Otherwise the Republican caucus would be the same circus with a different ringmaster.

    Politically though, it would be a bad move for Republicans. Jordan presents as a classless, disreputable person. I’m not saying that McCarthy is that classy but he’s got more dignity than Jordan ever will. Plus, I think Jordan is not that mentally acute and it shows. A lightweight.

    Also, Jordan’s elevation will put him and his past in the spotight like never before. He has a scandalous background at Ohio State’s athletic department and that will be more thoroughly aired out once he has such a prominent position. There are probably more shoes to drop there

    So for Republicans, I think it’s a high risk, low reward play.

    If McCarthy returns, his attempts at revenge could be interesting but they will just be attempts. There is not much he could do to the Maces and the Gaetzes. A powerful Speaker might influence their reelections but McCarthy has little political clout beyond his fundraising ability. There, he could help make Mace when she needed to win her first orimary in 2020, but I don’t think he can break her now that she’s the incumbent. Same with Gaetz.

    But maybe Republicans will go full circle and put him back into the Speaker’s Chair. He might have been the only one who could have gotten enough votes the last time and maybe he still is.

    But it could be that Republicans cannot get the votes for anyone, even after 15 ballots or more. Then I think a Speaker will still be elected, but by a different combination of electors.

  63. 63.

    Betty Cracker

    There’s much to dislike about Mace, but the thing I find most infuriating about her is the phony posturing as a feminist and how she cynically uses women’s issues as a shield.

    Even this dumb scarlet letter stunt is based on that — she claims she helped oust McCarthy because he didn’t listen to her on women’s issues. Come on. That’s as absurd as a chicken complaining the KFC manager is insensitive about the plight of poultry.

    And now the cynical fraud is trying to co-opt Hester Prynne? Fuck off with that shit, poser. The only woman Nancy Mace cares about is Nancy Mace.

  66. 66.

    Geminid

    Racy Mace wants to be Senator, I think. Lindsey Graham will likely retire in 2026, and she intends to have that seat.

  67. 67.

    Princess

    @Geminid: Given the choice between a Republican who is hollow inside and will do and say anything to get elected like Mace or one who is a true believer and fascist of the Tuberville sort, which are our two choices, I believe, in SC, I’ll take the Mace type for senator.

  69. 69.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Another Scott:

    It’s a conference of selfish trolls who are legendarily bad at vote counting.  I guess voting behind closed doors until they think they’re ready would help, but the practical issues of counting two hundred people’s votes will be enormous.  A lot of them will walk out because they’re lazy.  They’ll run to the press to bitch about each other.  Some of them are likely to change their minds in the actual vote.  Ultimately, this is nothing but the whip count any sane caucus always performs ahead of time, and days of nothing while they argue in private will still look terrible.

  70. 70.

    Geminid

    @Princess: I will probably be one or the other types. South Carolina is unlikely to elect a Democratic Senator this decade.

    Mace could get tripped up by a Voting Rights Act lawsuit that think the Supreme Court will hear this session. It might not turn the 1st CD blue, but it might put Mace in the dilemna of having to win reelection in a purple Congressional District while preparing a Senate run in a very red state.

    Fun 1st CD Fact: In the 1820s, the 1st CD was represented by Rep. Joel Poinsett, who later brought back the Poinsettia plant from Mexico. A dubious accomplishment in my opinion.

  71. 71.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    @Betty Cracker: Seems to be a lot of that going around – people who are, in fact, being shunned, but completely misunderstanding the reasons why. Like what’s-her-name from The Mandalorian (I do remember her name, but don’t want to name names, if that makes any sense), who went from having an entire series being written for her to being dismissed and shunned, and complaining to right-wing propagandists that she was being dismissed and canceled and centered for her courageous conservative views, when in fact it was because she was an unrepentant raging bigoted ass, and the Mouse decided it wasn’t worth it to try to defend her to the targets of her bigotry.

  72. 72.

    Geminid

    @Geminid: Correction: That should be “It will…” and not “I will…”

    I hope I’m not either of those types, and I know I will not be running for Senator in South Carolina.

  73. 73.

    Frankensteinbeck

    she was being dismissed and canceled and centered for her courageous conservative views, when in fact it was because she was an unrepentant raging bigoted ass

    I’m sure you know this, but it’s always important to say:  Being an unrepentant raging bigoted ass is the conservative view.  They are indeed being censored for it, a tiny bit by the government but mostly by mainstream society that is getting more inclusive all the time and no longer puts up with their abuse.

    So, they’re not imagining it, they’re just trying to leave out the parts that prove they’re the bad guys.

  74. 74.

    schrodingers_cat

    I  wrote this in July

    Mace gets fluffy coverage from the MSM because she is a better than average looking  a good lookingwhite woman even though she is as vile as any Gosar or Gaetz.

    She knows how to use this.

  75. 75.

    The Thin Black Duke

    @Bruce K in ATH-GR: Carano.

    What made her attitude more disgusting was one of Carano’s co-stars asked her to knock it off because he had a relative who was trans, but Carano ignored him.

    Fun fact: Ben Shapiro wrote and produced a western featuring Carano that only made $600 its opening weekend.

    Couldn’t happen to a nicer transphobic moron.

  77. 77.

    Ken

    @Baud: “Ruined” in the sense of “shot one more torpedo into the wreckage of a ship that was already rapidly on its way to the bottom”, perhaps.

  78. 78.

    Geminid

    This morning’s Politico Playbook has a fairly long item about the action in the House Republican Caucus today. They hope to take a vote on a caucus endorsement for Speaker.

    Both the Jordan camp and the Scalise camp expressed confidence that they have lined up a majority but as one Congressman pointed out, it’s a secret ballot so people can tell Jordan’s and Scalise’s whips what they want to hear.

    The endorsement can’t bind the caucus members’ votes on the House floor. It is a step in the right direction though.

    But they may not get to that vote today because first they have to wrangle over a proposed rule. It would require 217 votes for an endorsement, which this caucus might be able to pull off by Halloween.

    There is plenty more in the Playbook article for political junkies jonesing for a fix.

  79. 79.

    Geminid

    @Geminid: Meanwhile, members of the Democratic House Caucus are free to work out and hobnob in the Capitol gym, or hang out on the sunny Capitol steps and chat with reporters.

    Most will likely be at their laptops, plotting and coordinating their next moves on the House floor; sipping coffee and quietly humming “Kumbaya.”

  80. 80.

    Ken

    @Geminid: Both the Jordan camp and the Scalise camp expressed confidence that they have lined up a majority

    Obviously both can’t be right, but I do wonder at the cause. Members lying about their intent? One or both camps lying about the numbers they’re seeing?

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