Free Republic

Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy's revenge tour is sputtering to an end this week, with just one primary win to show for it. Why it matters: McCarthy's former colleagues complain he's effectively lit millions of dollars on fire and made it harder for new leaders to do their jobs. Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) is expected to win easily on Tuesday despite a McCarthy-linked PAC spending more than $3 million against him. "McCarthy thinks about me a lot more than I think about him," Gaetz told us. Between the lines: Multiple House Republicans and senior staff took issue with McCarthy's public...

During an interview on the Cats Roundtable with John Catsimatidis, disgraced former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy alleged that Kamala Harris is not truly in charge of her presidential campaign. Instead, he claims that Barack Obama is pulling the strings behind the scenes to orchestrate her election bid for November. .... Snip..... McCarthy pointed out that Harris has surrounded herself with individuals who were once part of Obama’s inner circle. “If you’re watching the campaign now, some of Obama’s key advisors, including David Plouffe, are working on her campaign,” McCarthy said, adding, “You’re getting Obama shifting from running the White House...

Freedom Caucus Chairman Bob Good (R-VA) suffered defeat in the recount for his June primary, making him the first House Republican incumbent to lose a primary challenge this election cycle. Good lost the recount to John McGuire, a former Navy SEAL, who won the primary by just 374 votes. The recount, which began Thursday morning, narrowed the race by just four votes with Good losing by 370.

Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said Tuedsay that attacks claiming Vice President Harris was hired as part of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives is “stupid.” “I would say, two attacks I’ve heard Republicans give that are totally stupid and dumb to do is the DEI attack, okay?” McCarthy said on NBC News’ “Meet the Press NOW.” “The other attack that I would not do is saying that the president has to resign,” he added. “That would be an advantage for Kamala.” Harris is likely to replace President Biden at the top of the Democratic ticket, after the incumbent...

Rep. Derrick Van Orden (R-Wis.) appeared to call Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) a “little b‑‑‑‑” after an awkward exchange with former Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) at the Republican National Convention. Gaetz taunted McCarthy on the floor of the convention on Tuesday night, telling the former speaker that he would “get booed off the stage” if he were to speak at the event. Van Orden reacted to a clip of the exchange on social media platform X, where he pushed back on a description of the incident that said Gaetz needed to be “physically held back” by security. “I just saw...

GOP Congressman Matt Gaetz confronted former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy at the RNC Convention in Milwaukee on Tuesday. “What night are you speaking? Are you speaking tonight?” Gaetz shouted at McCarthy as someone pulled the Florida lawmaker back. McCarthy ignored Gaetz so he came back and taunted him one more time. “If you took that stage you would booed off of it. You’d get booed off the stage!” Gaetz said to McCarthy. McCarthy refused to engage as Matt Gaetz pulled back. WATCH:

Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.), the assistant House Democratic leader, said the debt limit bill backed by Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) will be “dead on arrival” in the Senate. Clyburn said Saturday in an interview on MSNBC that he does not believe the Lift, Save, Grow Act — which the House narrowly passed in a 217-215 vote on Wednesday — itself will bring President Biden to negotiate on raising the debt ceiling, but negotiations can start after the House bill is dead.

Three high-profile primaries in U.S. House districts will be held tomorrow in South Carolina. In solidly Republican CD-3), seven candidates are vying to replace 7-term conservative Jeff Duncan, who is retiring rather than face a campaign that would feature nasty (and unproven) allegations from his vindictive soon-to-be ex-wife. In solidly Republican CD-4 Trump-supported incumbent William Timmons is facing conservative state legislator Adam Morgan, who is being boosted by outspoken conservative congressman Matt Gaetz of Florida. Timmons had no Democrat opposition in 2022 but he achieved only 52.7% in a four-way primary that year, and this one could be close too....

Last October, when Kevin McCarthy was ousted as speaker of the house, one Republican of the eight who voted against him stood out as the odd bedfellow of the group: a junior representative from South Carolina named Nancy Mace. The seven other Republicans, all men, were far-right rabble-rousers, loudmouths for whom grousing about the “establishment” rather than working with it was always the right political move. They were used to attracting and capitalizing on press attention. Yet in the days that followed McCarthy’s ouster, Mace outshone them all, showing up for work in a shirt with a red A on...

Former Speaker Kevin McCarthy on Sunday said that “every American should accept the results” of the upcoming presidential election, as some Republicans repeatedly refuse to say whether they’ll accept the results, regardless of who wins. Speaking to CNN’s “Inside Politics,” McCarthy also blasted Democrats for challenging “every single Republican elected president since George Bush,” specifically blaming Maryland Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin for saying that “Trump should be impeached before he was even sworn in.” “This is a question that’s for the whole American public. We’ve gotta get beyond it,” McCarthy added.

California Assemblyman Vince Fong appears to have handily won California’s special election yesterday, bringing the Republican Party’s slim majority in the House up to five. With 87 percent of the votes in, The New York Times had Fong up over opponent and fellow Republican Mike Boudreaux 60.2 to 39.8, making it essentially impossible for Boudreaux to win unless something happens to change that math. Fong won the special election to replace former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who resigned at the end of 2023 after being ousted from the speakership and endorsed Fong in the race. ... Fong had also been...

California state Assemblyman Vince Fong won the special election to fill Kevin McCarthy’s seat for the remainder of the former speaker’s term. Fong defeated Mike Boudreaux, 67.3 percent to 32.7 percent, according to Decision Desk. The two will go head-to-head again in November to win a full term. “I am filled with humility and gratitude tonight, as early results show that voters have overwhelmingly selected me to serve as their voice in Washington D.C.,” he said in a statement posted on X. “With the campaign over, the real work now begins,” he continued. “In Congress, I will remain focused on...

#1 Kevin McCarthy versus Matt GaetzFormer Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) made history on several fronts in the 118th Congress, none of them reason to crow. It took him 15 rounds of voting to overcome conservative resistance and win the gavel in January of 2023 — the longest Speaker’s vote since the Civil War. Nine months later he would be booted from power by eight of those same hard-liners, marking the first time since the nation’s founding that a Speaker was ejected. And standing at the center of both ordeals was Rep. Matt Gaetz, a Florida bomb-thrower who thrives on conflict...

Representative Tony Gonzales (R-TX) said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that his Republican colleagues Reps Matt Gaetz (R-FL) and Bob Good (R-VA) were “real scumbags.” Host Dana Bash said, “So, you voted yes on the foreign aid package,” Bash addressed Gonzales. “Do you have confidence that at this point, given that it is still possible that Marjorie Taylor Greene will push to vacate, to kick out of the Speaker’s chair, that he can survive?”

In a stunning interview Sunday morning on CNN, Rep. Tony Gonzales, a Republican congressman from Texas, accused fellow Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz of having sex with underaged girls. "It's my absolute honor to be in Congress, but I serve with some real scumbags," he said. "Look, Matt Gaetz, he paid minors to have sex with him at drug parties." This comes just a few weeks after former Speaker Kevin McCarthy said something similar at an event at Georgetown Univeristy. "I'll give you the truth why I'm not speaker," McCarthy said. "It's because one person, a member of Congress, wanted me...

Several frustrated House Republicans are breaking with congressional norms to boost the primary opponent of House Freedom Caucus chairman Bob Good. The Virginia Republican was one of eight lawmakers who voted to remove their party’s leader, former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, in October. McCarthy, who resigned in December, now plans to return the favor. McCarthy, and his friends on the Hill, including House Armed Services Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Ala., and Rep. Derrick Van Orden, R-Wis., have endorsed and fundraised for Good’s primary challenger, state Sen. John McGuire, CNN reported on Sunday. The delayed fallout from the removal of McCarthy forms...

Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) hit back at former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Monday after he said she needs help “to straighten out her life” last week, twisting the insult into a fundraising pitch. McCarthy went after Mace on Tuesday in a Capitol Hill visit. The pair have feuded after she was one of eight GOP members who voted to oust him from the Speakership in October. “I hope Nancy gets the help she needs, I really do,” McCarthy told reporters. “I just hope she gets the help to straighten out her life. I mean, she’s got a lot of...

Former Congressman Kevin McCarthy is said to be undertaking a "revenge operation" against those who ended his tenure as Speaker of the House. McCarthy was voted out of the speakership last October by a slim margin after a handful of Republicans sided with Democrats in supporting a motion to vacate.Now, according to a report from Politico, McCarthy is reportedly plotting his revenge against the eight Republican lawmakers he believes betrayed him. The outlet reported:A top McCarthy ally, Brian O. Walsh, is overseeing an attempt to recruit primary challengers to take on members of the infamous “Gaetz Eight” — the Capitol’s...

Former President Donald Trump is facing a backlash after calling one of the most conservative members of Congress a RINO who should be primaried—one week after the filing deadline. Trump blasted Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, on Truth Social after the congressman endorsed Trump’s rival, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, for president. “Has any smart and energetic Republican in the Great State of Texas decided to run in the Primary against RINO Congressman Chip Roy,” Trump wrote. “For the right person, he is very beatable. If interested, let me know!!!” Trump’s comments appeared to...

California Secretary of State Shirley Weber announced on Friday that Assemblyman Vince Fong cannot run for former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy's (R-CA) House seat next year because he has already filed to run for state Assembly. Weber confirmed that under California state law, a candidate cannot appear on one ballot for two separate offices. "Under state law, a candidate who has filed their declaration of candidacy is not permitted to withdraw as a candidate at that primary election," the secretary said in a statement. "Mr. Fong filed his completed nomination documents for Assembly District 32 prior to the close of...