WASHINGTON—The House’s ruling Republicans, in their endless battles over whom to nominate for Speaker, have become the political equivalent of The Bronx Zoo.
If you’re a baseball fan, you remember that book. It was relief pitcher Sparky Lyle’s description of his dysfunctional team, the 1970s New York Yankees.
Team where manager Billy Martin—an alcoholic—aid of his superstar, Reggie Jackson, and team owner George Steinbrenner, “One’s a born liar and the other’s convicted.” Steinbrenner, found guilty of illegal corporate campaign contributions to Richard Nixon, fired, and rehired, Martin at least four times.
At least those Yankees, dysfunctional or not, won. Not these Republicans.
Their latest try was with incumbent House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, R-Minn. He led on all ballots, steadily eliminating six competitors, all of them right-wingers in way, shape, and form. But he had made one major mistake which sunk his candidacy: Emmer had voted to certify Joe Biden’s election to the presidency, one of the few House Republicans to do so in the Trumpite invasion-disrupted balloting of Jan. 6, 2021.
And that made enough Trumpite Republicans mad enough to tank his try. In a secret vote after his formal nomination, to see how close—or how far—he was from the 217 Republicans he needed to become Speaker, 26 voted “no” or for someone else.
Emmer could afford to lose only four of the House’s 221 Republicans. So he dropped out, in a day.
Emmer’s electoral stance also unleashed Trump...
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