Speakerless In Seattle

Hello, it’s the weekend. This is The Weekender ☕

As of Friday evening, House Republicans had still not elected a speaker. 

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), who Republicans picked as their nominee in a private meeting, was a hefty 60-ish votes short. Rep. Austin Scott (R-GA), who many people had not heard of until this morning — and who said he hadn’t planned on running for Speaker until today — netted roughly 80 mostly anti-Jordan votes. 

Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA), once the heir apparent, had withdrawn his name after a nasty couple of days where he couldn’t close the gap, and even bled some initial support. 

Republicans disbanded in despair, planning for a floor vote on Tuesday. 

The past two weeks have been utter chaos. There’s been finger pointing, and juicy quotes, and lawmakers nearly jogging to the mob of reporters, eager to cast aspersions on their colleagues. 

House Democrats, passing around popcorn, continue to remind their furious colleagues that they could always join with the Democrats and pick some acceptable moderate, all for the low, low price of giving Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) some extra power. 

It’s not at all clear, at this moment, that anybody in the House Republican caucus can get to 217 votes. I have never heard lawmakers so candid, so spin-less, in their characterizations of the utter shambles in which their party sits. 
 

And we’re still more or less the only ones reporting ahead, pointing out that even if they can coalesce behind a speaker, it seems likely that the one-member threshold to trigger the motion to vacate will remain — dooming him/her from the start. 

This is a monster of Republicans’ own making. By welcoming with open arms the reactive, wholly anti-government, pro-attention at all costs faction of the party, they made it inevitable that these people — either by critical mass or tiny margins — would wield enough power to completely break the system. 

This embarrassing, chaotic garbage fire is the reaping.  

More on other news below. Let’s dig in. 

— Kate Riga

Credit Where Credit Is Due

Back in January, we reported on an element of the George Santos saga that had not been reported anywhere else: Donors who gave to Santos’ campaign alleged that they were subsequently subjected to thousands of dollars in false credit card charges.

On Tuesday, when federal prosecutors unveiled a new superseding indictment against Santos, this “credit card scheme” was a central element of the charges. The indictment confirmed much of TPM’s prior reporting and also added a ton of new details, which, of course, we dug into in depth. 

Even amid all of Santos’ lies, allegedly taking his own contributors credit cards for a ride stands out as corrupt and brazen. It is also, as one expert told us, simply unprecedented. 
 

The whole saga is also a reminder of the type of original investigative work that we can do thanks to TPM’s amazing subscribers. With your support we were way ahead on this story — and we plan to stick with it. 

— Hunter Walker

Feds Up The Ante On Gold Bars Menendez

Manhattan federal prosecutors slapped Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) with another charge this week: conspiracy to act as a foreign agent, in this case, of Egypt.

It’s a wild allegation for Menendez. The allegations cover a period from 2018 through 2022, when he was a senior member and then chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

That’s a powerful post from which to do what the indictment describes: receive benefits from a lucrative halal meat monopoly in exchange for helping Egypt make the unfortunate case of April Corley go away. Corley, an American roller skater, was on vacation in Egypt in 2015 when a U.S.-supplied Apache helicopter strafed her tour group, maiming her. She’s been fighting for compensation since; Menendez allegedly worked with the Egyptians in secret to stymie her bid.

And, sure, Menendez allegedly received gold bars, car payments, furniture, and tens of thousands of dollars routed by the halal meat monopoly in exchange for that favor and others. But, in my view, the mere material benefits offer a necessary but insufficient explanation for the alleged wrongdoing here. Some people do things just because they can.

— Josh Kovensky

• Whoever The Next House Speaker Is, He’s Doomed
• Arguments On South Carolina’s Maps Show How Thoroughly Supreme Court Broke Redistricting
• House Republicans Bet On Divine Intervention
• Georgia Republicans Put Their Yearslong Fani Willis Payback Scheme Into Motion
• Key Trump Attorney Fights To Have 2020 Coup Arguments Legitimized
• Don’t Let Trump Repeat His New York Case Social Posts, Government Says
• George Santos Dismisses His Latest Rival As Democrats Line Up To Take Him On

— Nicole Lafond

“I think people that never held public office, like you, maybe they’re not qualified to be president! Anyway.”

That’s Donald Trump’s No. 1 fan, MAGA enthusiast and Fox News personality Sean Hannity expressing exasperated irritation with supposed 2024 presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy. It’s a relatable emotion.

After a heated interview with the young entrepreneur who is using his run for the Republican nomination seemingly to piss off other Republicans and get some attention, Hannity grew agitated to the point of scolding Ramaswamy on how to be a better politician. All hell broke loose when Ramaswamy insinuated to the longtime Fox News host that he liked talking to his old colleague, Tucker Carlson, better.

That hit a nerve. Hannity told Ramaswamy goodbye and waved him off the screen as his producers cut the feed. That’s when Hannity forgot his MAGA allegiances for a sec and lamented that people who haven’t held public office before shouldn’t be president.

👀 👀 👀 🍿 🍿 🍿 while he gets ratio’d to hell on Trump’s bootleg Twitter, Truth Social.

— Nicole Lafond