The ‘Never Kevin’ Mutiny In The GQP Should Be Entertaining To Watch

My wife got me one of those holiday tins of popcorn that come with three flavors for Christmas. I am saving it for January 3 when House Republicans try, and presumably fail, to elect “Traitor” Kevin McCarthy Speaker of the House. This should be entertaining to watch.

Politico’s Playbook reported on the “Never Kevin” mutiny in the GQP last week:

We sat down with Rep. Bob Good for the Playbook Deep Dive podcast this week to try to understand the rebellion brewing against McCarthy. We not only came away convinced that Good is probably never going to back the California Republican for speaker but gained a glimpse at how the opposition has been driven by strategic, ideological and, at times, personal reasons.

Had Republicans flipped the House by a broader margin, as they were expected to, Good would likely be dismissed by his colleagues as a gadfly. But given the unexpectedly slim margin, Good and a handful of like-minded conservatives hold McCarthy’s fate in their hands — and stand ready to wield considerable power next year, no matter who ends up as speaker.

We also learned that Good & Co. are formulating a plan for the Jan. 3 speaker vote. Anti-McCarthy members are currently plotting to back [Coup Plotter and Insurrectionist] Rep. ANDY BIGGS (R-Ariz.) on the first ballot, he said, to prove McCarthy can’t get the gavel. But once the second ballot is called, they’ll begin coalescing around another, unnamed candidate — a GOP lawmaker most have already agreed upon, Good said, but will not name for fear of hurting this person’s candidacy.

So a current member of Congress? Because all the Beltway speculation has been about a candidate who is not a current member of Congress (it is not required to be Speaker of the House). I’m still holding out for the “Revenge of Crying John Boehner” deep in the balloting when a half-dozen fed up Republicans join with Democrats to elect an outsider Republican. Boehner has the advantage of previously having been speaker, and he has scores to settle for his previous ouster.

More reasons Good said he opposes McCarthy:

— IDEOLOGY: “Kevin McCarthy is not a conservative; he doesn’t have an ideological core,” Good told us, echoing a criticism that’s been made many times over. “He kind of just floats with whatever’s politically expedient.” Worse, he said, is that “even those who are supporting him will privately tell you they know he’s untrustworthy,” Good said, citing conversations with colleagues who include a committee ranking member. He posited that McCarthy delayed key organizing decisions until after the Jan. 3 vote because “I suspect he’s promised … multiple people the same thing.”

— STRATEGY: Good recalled hearing McCarthy tell his freshman class that “we’re going to run the floor; we’re going to stop the Pelosi agenda.” But Good contends that McCarthy didn’t do nearly everything in his power to fight Democrats. As Democrats warred with each other over their domestic agenda, Good said he and his comrades pleaded with McCarthy to call a vote on removing Pelosi as speaker. McCarthy refused, possibly because he was thinking about Democrats trying to pull the same stunt on him someday.

— HIS CONSTITUENCY: Good told us that since he started campaigning for the House, he’s had “hundreds” of voters urge him to oppose McCarthy as leader. During a recent GOP conference meeting, he recalled, a pro-McCarthy lawmaker stood to blast the “Never Kevin” cadre, complaining that “y’all are making it hard on us back home — we’re hearing from all kinds of folks telling us not to vote for McCarthy for speaker.” Said Good: “You ought to listen to your constituents.”

Good has plenty of other grievances: He’s angry that McCarthy initially defended Cheney after she voted to impeach Trump; that McCarthy allowed about a dozen House Republicans to back last year’s $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill without consequence; and that McCarthy chided members like him who have demanded recorded votes on noncontroversial bills Democrats have brought to the floor — to name a few.

So Good is a bomb thrower extremist.

So who else could do the job?

While Good said there are “a number of credible individuals” who could muster enough Republican votes, he insisted “there is large support for one individual in particular … a conservative who can get to 218 and would do an effective job.” [No such GQP member of Congress exits.] While Playbook reported extensively this week on the quiet effort to prepare No. 2 leader STEVE SCALISE as an alternative, Good stayed mum, explaining that this person “cannot be part of, and they are not part of, the effort to block McCarthy.”

Good predicted McCarthy would give in to the rule-change demands a larger group of House conservatives are demanding. But he said 10 to 20 Republicans would still vote against McCarthy on Jan. 3. “He’s not going to be speaker,” Good said, insisting he certainly won’t get Good’s own vote: “He doesn’t have anything that I want.”

We reached out to Good late Thursday night after his meeting with McCarthy to ask if he’d had a change of heart. His response? “No change… thank you!”

Pace yourself on the popcorn, we may be here awhile.

C-Span will stay with the vote, but I can’t tell if the cable channels will.