On Sunday, former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy accused Representative Matt Gaetz of trying to get him “to do something illegal,” which he further claimed led to the motion to oust him from his speakership role last year.

McCarthy, a California Republican, served as speaker of the House from January to October of 2023, presiding over a razor-thin GOP majority and a caucus bitterly divided between more moderate members and those further to the right. Following a deal with Democratic members to get a temporary government funding bill passed, Gaetz, a Florida Republican, filed a motion to oust McCarthy from the speakership, leading to the first ouster of a sitting speaker by a floor vote during a session of Congress.

similar motion to oust the current GOP speaker, Representative Mike Johnson of Louisiana, was just filed by Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Georgia Republican, though she has characterized it as more of a warning after the passage of a $1.2 trillion government funding bill that she did not support.

    • @Ekybio
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      596 months ago

      With a Republican?

      Other possible options are:

      • Out of state abortion for his “”“wife”“”
      • Fraud (Any kind, but mostly taxes)
      • Even more kids
      • Hatespeech
      • Any combination of the above
      • @Grimy
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        6 months ago

        Definitely not for hate speech. That would just make him more popular with his base.

        • @dhork
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          206 months ago

          No, but it could create an illegal absence which impacts her High School attendance record…

          • @meco03211
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            166 months ago

            Transporting a minor across state lines would certainly be illegal.

        • circuscritic
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          36 months ago

          It’s honestly embarrassing that their are so many downvotes to your simple objective statement.

          I’m going to guess it’s not because they think you’re wrong, but because they actually find the idea that hate speech isn’t a standalone crime dangerous, which is batshit crazy.

          • @[email protected]
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            16 months ago

            Isn’t Texas and some other states actually passing or trying to pass a law to make it illegal to get an out of state abortion? Iirc some local counties passed them over there already.

            Not that it matters cause fuck em.

            • circuscritic
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              6 months ago

              Unless they invented time machines to pass those laws to just before McCarthy being ousted, they aren’t relevant to this situation.

    • @eskimofry
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      76 months ago

      Probably illegal kids too, bussed from Florida or something

  • @[email protected]
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    6 months ago

    The motion against him from Gaetz, however, he blamed on a personal matter and accused Gaetz of trying to get him to illegally shut down an ethics committee investigation.

    It was shutting down the ethics investigation into Gaetz, as we all knew at the time. Just didn’t know that would be illegal.

    • @agent_flounder
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      6 months ago

      The ethics matter McCarthy referred to pertains to an investigation into Gaetz dating back to 2021, which alleged that, according to The New York Times, “he engaged in sexual misconduct and illicit drug use, shared inappropriate images or videos on the House floor, misused state identification records, converted campaign funds to personal use and accepted impermissible gifts under House rules, among other allegation.”

      So Gaetz asked McCarthy to shut down the ethics investigation into all this, which totally sounds like something that an innocent, honest, upstanding person would do. /s

  • @Viking_Hippie
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    6 months ago

    caucus bitterly divided between more moderate members and those further to the right

    Bullshit. It’s divided between hyper-authoritarian fascists and anti-authoritarian (except when it comes to praising Trump, cops, corporations and sometimes war) AnCap children.

    There has been no such thing as a moderate Republican in Washington for at least 20 years.

    • FuglyDuck
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      66 months ago

      Naw that would have been an accusation of not sharing.