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Scalise scrambles for votes to become House speaker as hard-line Republicans hold out – US politics live | US politics

Scalise to battle for votes to become House Speaker, as GOP hard-liners hold out

Louisiana congressman and House majority leader Steve Scalise has a fierce battle on his hands among warring House Republicans as he tried to scramble enough support from his own party to be elected speaker.

House Republicans voted behind closed doors on Wednesday and chose right-winger Scalise over his more hard-line rival Jim Jordan of Ohio to be nominated for the speakership.

But the vote was pretty close, 113 votes for Scalise vs 99 votes for Jordan and, despite Jordan then endorsing Scalise. It’s unclear this morning whether the nominee can win over enough support to get through the definitive vote of the whole House.

A small but decisive number of hard-line holdouts within the Republican conference are currently blocking Steve Scalise’s passage to the top job.

With Republicans’ razor-thin majority over Democrats in the House, Scalise can only afford four defections within the GOP conference and still win the speakership, assuming all 433 current House members participate in the vote.

As of Wednesday evening, at least 11 House Republicans had signaled they would not support Scalise on the floor, with several more still undecided. A full report on this from the Guardian’s Joan E Greve, is here.

Key events

Donald Trump’s comments calling Hezbollah “smart” and criticizing Israel’s defense minister were “dangerous and unhinged,” White House spokesman Andrew Bates said on Thursday and Reuters reports.

Statements like this are dangerous and unhinged. It’s completely lost on us why any American would ever praise an Iran-backed terrorist organization as ‘smart’,’” Bates said.

Trump, who is seeking the Republican nomination to run against US president Joe Biden in the 2024 election, in comments to supporters in Florida on Wednesday night, said Hezbollah was “very smart” and called Israel’s defense minister Yoav Gallant “a jerk.”

Hezbollah is a Lebanese Shia Islamist political party and militant group. Hezbollah has threatened to join the fray on the other side of its border to the south if an Israeli ground invasion of Gaza is launched in the Israel-Hamas war that erupted on Saturday. The group has already claimed responsibility for rocket fire into Israel in the current conflict, and deadly clashes have erupted on the border. More from the Guardian’s Bethan McKernan and Quique Kierszenbaum, here.

Trump’s Mar-a-Lago criminal case back in federal court

Hugo Lowell

A federal judge was expected on Thursday to weigh whether the lawyers for Donald Trump’s two co-defendants, charged with trying to obstruct the US justice department from retrieving classified documents from his Mar-a-Lago club, had conflicts of interest and should be ordered off the case.

The hearings – at 1pm and 3pm ET – are notable because an adverse decision by US district judge Aileen Cannon could have major ramifications: Trump’s lawyers are in an informal joint defense agreement with his co-defendants’ lawyers, which could be upended if new lawyers were to come in.

At issue is the fact that the lawyer for Trump’s first co-defendant and valet, Walt Nauta, and the lawyer for Trump’s second co-defendant and Mar-a-Lago maintenance worker, Carlos De Oliveira, have also represented people that prosecutors are considering using as trial witnesses.

Trump and Nauta were initially charged in an indictment alleging the former president retained national defense documents and conspired with Nauta to obstruct justice. Trump, Nauta and De Oliveira were then charged in July with additional counts in a superseding indictment.

You can read the full Guardian report here.

The Florida federal case is just one of Trump’s many legal woes. The civil fraud trial in New York involving his business empire is ongoing.

Donald Trump after delivering remarks at a rally for his 2024 presidential campaign in West Palm Beach, Florida, not far from his Mar-a-Lago residence and members club in Palm Beach.
Donald Trump after delivering remarks at a rally for his 2024 presidential campaign in West Palm Beach, Florida, not far from his Mar-a-Lago residence and members club in Palm Beach. Photograph: Alon Skuy/Getty Images

There is some swift walking-back going on from the direction of the White House after Joe Biden said as part of his impassioned remarks yesterday on atrocities by Hamas militants against Israelis that he saw photographic evidence of beheaded children.

During a round table with US Jewish community leaders, the US president said: “I never thought that I would see and have confirmed pictures of terrorists beheading children.”

Insider reported last night that: “Later in the evening on Wednesday, a National Security official told NPR that Biden was referring to media reports when he made that remark. CNN reported Wednesday night that a White House official said that neither Biden nor the administration had seen these images and that Biden was referring to comments from Israeli officials and reports in the media.”

Republican Steve Scalise is seen as a fighter, but becoming House speaker might require a brawl.

That’s the fascinating headline from The Associated Press this morning. Here’s some of their report, lightly edited for structure and length:

A narrow majority of House Republicans nominated Scalise as their next House speaker on Wednesday, following the unprecedented ousting of the former speaker, California Representative Kevin McCarthy.

Scalise, 58, and recently diagnosed with blood cancer, spent the rest of the day holed up in the stately Speaker’s office at the Capitol, vigorously working to secure the support he will need from his detractors to lead the divided Republican majority ahead of a full House vote to take the gavel.

As we’ve all witnessed, he is a fighter. He has proven against all odds he can get the job done and come back from adversity,” said Republican congressman Andy Barr of Kentucky.

Scalise was seriously injured in 2017 when a gunman opened fire on Republican politicians practicing for a charity baseball game near Washington, one of four wounded in the attack. As he was being flown to hospital, he feared he could die.

Scalise was first elected to Congress in 2008, after more than a decade in the state legislature, and swiftly rose through the ranks in Washington.

Once Republicans took majority control in the 2010 election “tea party” wave of hardline lawmakers to Congress, Scalise soon became part of the House leadership team alongside McCarthy and others under the-speaker John Boehner.

An early rivalry developed between Scalise and McCarthy that punctuated their rise, and continues to this day.

The speaker’s job can be brutal and thankless, with busy travel across the country raising campaign cash and recruiting candidates for elections.

Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene said she would continue supporting Jim Jordan (who was defeated for the nomination) because she wants to see Scalise “defeat cancer more than sacrifice his health” in a demanding job.

Meanwhile, some Republicans are bothered that Scalise addressed a white supremacist group in 2002 founded by former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke. Scalise apologized in 2014.

He has an uphill battle to get to the 217 votes he’ll need on the House floor to secure the speaker’s gavel for himself.

Here’s Guardian columnist Robert Reich’s take via X/Twitter.

Steve Scalise voted to overturn the 2020 election.

He reportedly called himself “David Duke without the baggage.”

And now he wants to be speaker of the House?

When I say the GOP is an extremist party, this is why.

— Robert Reich (@RBReich) October 11, 2023

Scalise to battle for votes to become House Speaker, as GOP hard-liners hold out

Louisiana congressman and House majority leader Steve Scalise has a fierce battle on his hands among warring House Republicans as he tried to scramble enough support from his own party to be elected speaker.

House Republicans voted behind closed doors on Wednesday and chose right-winger Scalise over his more hard-line rival Jim Jordan of Ohio to be nominated for the speakership.

But the vote was pretty close, 113 votes for Scalise vs 99 votes for Jordan and, despite Jordan then endorsing Scalise. It’s unclear this morning whether the nominee can win over enough support to get through the definitive vote of the whole House.

A small but decisive number of hard-line holdouts within the Republican conference are currently blocking Steve Scalise’s passage to the top job.

With Republicans’ razor-thin majority over Democrats in the House, Scalise can only afford four defections within the GOP conference and still win the speakership, assuming all 433 current House members participate in the vote.

As of Wednesday evening, at least 11 House Republicans had signaled they would not support Scalise on the floor, with several more still undecided. A full report on this from the Guardian’s Joan E Greve, is here.

House Republican divide sends Scalise scrambling for votes to become speaker

Hello US politics live blog readers, another lively news day is unfolding in Washington and we’ll bring it all to you as it happens.

House Republicans may have picked Louisiana congressman Steve Scalise as their nominee to become speaker, replacing Kevin McCarthy, who was abruptly ousted by hard-liners in his own party eight days ago, but Scalise doesn’t yet have the support he needs in the bag and it’s unknown if or when a full floor vote will happen today.

There’s action in the Trump Mar-a-Lago criminal court case in Florida and, in the crisis in Israel, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has been meeting with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu there this morning and we’ll keep you up to speed, while suggesting for more detail you follow all the news on the ground from Israel and Gaza in our global live blog, here.

Here’s what afoot:

  • Steve Scalise, having beaten Trump favorite Jim Jordan to be nominated by House Republicans to become the next speaker of the lower congressional chamber, which the GOP narrowly controls, has much work to do to win enough support to be awarded the speaker’s gavel.

  • The House is still in recess and is due to commence business at 12pm ET – if the GOP is ready to put House majority leader Scalise forward for a full floor vote on the speakership after his narrow victory over Jordan in closed-door voting on Wednesday.

  • Democrats will nominate House minority leader and New York congressman Hakeem Jeffries to be their nominee for speaker. They don’t have the votes to elect him as speaker, of course, but it’s a strong signal of their unanimity and rejection of the GOP’s antics.

  • Republicans will be hoping to avoid a repeat of the embarrassing spectacle in January where McCarthy had to menace and wheedle his way in real time through a record 15 rounds of voting.

  • Scalise can only afford to lose four of his own party’s votes to secure the 217 majority he needs and right now there are too many hard-liners shunning him and too many Jordan voters who haven’t committed publicly to know if/how he can make it.

  • The Mar-a-Lago classified document-hoarding criminal case against Donald Trump will be back in a Florida court today, where the federal judge is expected to weigh whether lawyers for two of the former president’s co-defendants had conflicts of interest and should be ordered off the case.



Summarize this content to 100 words Scalise to battle for votes to become House Speaker, as GOP hard-liners hold outLouisiana congressman and House majority leader Steve Scalise has a fierce battle on his hands among warring House Republicans as he tried to scramble enough support from his own party to be elected speaker.House Republicans voted behind closed doors on Wednesday and chose right-winger Scalise over his more hard-line rival Jim Jordan of Ohio to be nominated for the speakership.But the vote was pretty close, 113 votes for Scalise vs 99 votes for Jordan and, despite Jordan then endorsing Scalise. It’s unclear this morning whether the nominee can win over enough support to get through the definitive vote of the whole House.A small but decisive number of hard-line holdouts within the Republican conference are currently blocking Steve Scalise’s passage to the top job.With Republicans’ razor-thin majority over Democrats in the House, Scalise can only afford four defections within the GOP conference and still win the speakership, assuming all 433 current House members participate in the vote.As of Wednesday evening, at least 11 House Republicans had signaled they would not support Scalise on the floor, with several more still undecided. A full report on this from the Guardian’s Joan E Greve, is here.Updated at 10.27 EDTKey eventsShow key events onlyPlease turn on JavaScript to use this featureDonald Trump’s comments calling Hezbollah “smart” and criticizing Israel’s defense minister were “dangerous and unhinged,” White House spokesman Andrew Bates said on Thursday and Reuters reports. Statements like this are dangerous and unhinged. It’s completely lost on us why any American would ever praise an Iran-backed terrorist organization as ‘smart’,’” Bates said. Trump, who is seeking the Republican nomination to run against US president Joe Biden in the 2024 election, in comments to supporters in Florida on Wednesday night, said Hezbollah was “very smart” and called Israel’s defense minister Yoav Gallant “a jerk.”Hezbollah is a Lebanese Shia Islamist political party and militant group. Hezbollah has threatened to join the fray on the other side of its border to the south if an Israeli ground invasion of Gaza is launched in the Israel-Hamas war that erupted on Saturday. The group has already claimed responsibility for rocket fire into Israel in the current conflict, and deadly clashes have erupted on the border. More from the Guardian’s Bethan McKernan and Quique Kierszenbaum, here.Updated at 10.28 EDTTrump’s Mar-a-Lago criminal case back in federal courtHugo LowellA federal judge was expected on Thursday to weigh whether the lawyers for Donald Trump’s two co-defendants, charged with trying to obstruct the US justice department from retrieving classified documents from his Mar-a-Lago club, had conflicts of interest and should be ordered off the case.The hearings – at 1pm and 3pm ET – are notable because an adverse decision by US district judge Aileen Cannon could have major ramifications: Trump’s lawyers are in an informal joint defense agreement with his co-defendants’ lawyers, which could be upended if new lawyers were to come in.At issue is the fact that the lawyer for Trump’s first co-defendant and valet, Walt Nauta, and the lawyer for Trump’s second co-defendant and Mar-a-Lago maintenance worker, Carlos De Oliveira, have also represented people that prosecutors are considering using as trial witnesses.Trump and Nauta were initially charged in an indictment alleging the former president retained national defense documents and conspired with Nauta to obstruct justice. Trump, Nauta and De Oliveira were then charged in July with additional counts in a superseding indictment.You can read the full Guardian report here.The Florida federal case is just one of Trump’s many legal woes. The civil fraud trial in New York involving his business empire is ongoing.Donald Trump after delivering remarks at a rally for his 2024 presidential campaign in West Palm Beach, Florida, not far from his Mar-a-Lago residence and members club in Palm Beach. Photograph: Alon Skuy/Getty ImagesUpdated at 10.28 EDTThere is some swift walking-back going on from the direction of the White House after Joe Biden said as part of his impassioned remarks yesterday on atrocities by Hamas militants against Israelis that he saw photographic evidence of beheaded children.During a round table with US Jewish community leaders, the US president said: “I never thought that I would see and have confirmed pictures of terrorists beheading children.”Insider reported last night that: “Later in the evening on Wednesday, a National Security official told NPR that Biden was referring to media reports when he made that remark. CNN reported Wednesday night that a White House official said that neither Biden nor the administration had seen these images and that Biden was referring to comments from Israeli officials and reports in the media.”Republican Steve Scalise is seen as a fighter, but becoming House speaker might require a brawl.That’s the fascinating headline from The Associated Press this morning. Here’s some of their report, lightly edited for structure and length:A narrow majority of House Republicans nominated Scalise as their next House speaker on Wednesday, following the unprecedented ousting of the former speaker, California Representative Kevin McCarthy.Scalise, 58, and recently diagnosed with blood cancer, spent the rest of the day holed up in the stately Speaker’s office at the Capitol, vigorously working to secure the support he will need from his detractors to lead the divided Republican majority ahead of a full House vote to take the gavel. As we’ve all witnessed, he is a fighter. He has proven against all odds he can get the job done and come back from adversity,” said Republican congressman Andy Barr of Kentucky. Scalise was seriously injured in 2017 when a gunman opened fire on Republican politicians practicing for a charity baseball game near Washington, one of four wounded in the attack. As he was being flown to hospital, he feared he could die.Scalise was first elected to Congress in 2008, after more than a decade in the state legislature, and swiftly rose through the ranks in Washington.Once Republicans took majority control in the 2010 election “tea party” wave of hardline lawmakers to Congress, Scalise soon became part of the House leadership team alongside McCarthy and others under the-speaker John Boehner.An early rivalry developed between Scalise and McCarthy that punctuated their rise, and continues to this day.The speaker’s job can be brutal and thankless, with busy travel across the country raising campaign cash and recruiting candidates for elections.Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene said she would continue supporting Jim Jordan (who was defeated for the nomination) because she wants to see Scalise “defeat cancer more than sacrifice his health” in a demanding job.Meanwhile, some Republicans are bothered that Scalise addressed a white supremacist group in 2002 founded by former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke. Scalise apologized in 2014.He has an uphill battle to get to the 217 votes he’ll need on the House floor to secure the speaker’s gavel for himself.Here’s Guardian columnist Robert Reich’s take via X/Twitter.Steve Scalise voted to overturn the 2020 election. He reportedly called himself “David Duke without the baggage.”And now he wants to be speaker of the House?When I say the GOP is an extremist party, this is why.— Robert Reich (@RBReich) October 11, 2023Updated at 09.52 EDTScalise to battle for votes to become House Speaker, as GOP hard-liners hold outLouisiana congressman and House majority leader Steve Scalise has a fierce battle on his hands among warring House Republicans as he tried to scramble enough support from his own party to be elected speaker.House Republicans voted behind closed doors on Wednesday and chose right-winger Scalise over his more hard-line rival Jim Jordan of Ohio to be nominated for the speakership.But the vote was pretty close, 113 votes for Scalise vs 99 votes for Jordan and, despite Jordan then endorsing Scalise. It’s unclear this morning whether the nominee can win over enough support to get through the definitive vote of the whole House.A small but decisive number of hard-line holdouts within the Republican conference are currently blocking Steve Scalise’s passage to the top job.With Republicans’ razor-thin majority over Democrats in the House, Scalise can only afford four defections within the GOP conference and still win the speakership, assuming all 433 current House members participate in the vote.As of Wednesday evening, at least 11 House Republicans had signaled they would not support Scalise on the floor, with several more still undecided. A full report on this from the Guardian’s Joan E Greve, is here.Updated at 10.27 EDTHouse Republican divide sends Scalise scrambling for votes to become speakerHello…
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2023/oct/12/biden-israel-steve-scalise-republican-house-speaker-vote-politics-latest Scalise scrambles for votes to become House speaker as hard-line Republicans hold out – US politics live | US politics

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