There has been mounting speculation on Capitol Hill that the House Freedom Caucus and others on the right want Speaker Paul Ryan to relinquish his gavel now and permit House Republicans to elect a new speaker.
On Tuesday afternoon, however, one of the most vocal of the Freedom Caucus told Newsmax that this just wasn’t true. “It would be premature to have a race while we have a speaker now,” said Rep. Warren Davidson, R-Ohio. “We’ve got the ball right now, and we are advancing our agenda.”
Davidson also pointed out that there may be as many as “three dozen new Republican members elected this year, and we should respect them enough to let them participate in the election of a new speaker.”
The Ohio lawmaker made his remarks at “Conversations With Conservatives,” a monthly meeting of Freedom Caucus members and the press on Capitol Hill.
Five other conservative Republican House members joined Davidson at the Tuesday meeting and none disagreed with his statement that Ryan must remain as speaker through the rest of the year.
One of them, fellow Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, said that the actions of the House on immigration were “contrary to the mandate of 2016” and a discharge petition was needed to bring to a vote tougher immigration legislation as well as repeal of the Affordable Care Act.
John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. For more of his reports, Go Here Now.
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