House Democrats Signal They Won’t Rescue McCarthy From Motion To Vacate

As far-right conservatives are making noise about filing a motion to vacate against Kevin McCarthy, Democrats aren’t offering to bail the speaker out.

Here is what House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) told reporters in response to a potential motion to vacate against McCarthy.

Jeffries says it is “premature” to speculate whether Dems will rescue McCarthy in a motion to vacate vote. https://t.co/IPGyiUwiw6

— Andrew Solender (@AndrewSolender) May 30, 2023

The Freedom Caucus is grumbling and issued vague threats about needing to rethink the structure of leadership in the House, but the Democratic position has been through McCarthy’s struggles that Republicans won the majority and they have to these disputes among themselves.

If Democrats were open to helping McCarthy, Leader Jeffries would say so, but that is not what he said.

Kevin McCarthy has not been a good partner to House Democrats. He has lied and smeared many of them at every turn.

It would be shocking if House Democrats lifted a finger to help McCarthy. As anger grows on the right over the debt limit/budget deal, the speaker tries to sell failure as success and hope he can hang on to his job. 

If push comes to shove and the far-right of the House caucus does follow through on its threat to potentially try to oust Kevin McCarthy, Democrats will likely do the same thing that they did during the 15 ballots that it took to get McCarthy elected speaker.

Expect Democrats to sit back and enjoy the show and not do anything to rescue Kevin McCarthy.

Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.

Awards and  Professional Memberships

Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association