WASHINGTON (States Newsroom) — U.S. House Republicans elected Louisiana Rep. Steve Scalise as their nominee for speaker Wednesday following a secret ballot vote in a closed-door conference, according to Republicans leaving the meeting.
The next step for Scalise, who currently is the majority leader, will be garnering the support of nearly all his GOP colleagues to win a floor vote to become speaker, replacing former Speaker Kevin McCarthy of California.
The nominee picked in the conference meeting only needed to get the backing of a majority of the 221 House Republicans, but Scalise will need about 217 on the floor before he can hold the gavel.
Rep. Kevin Hern of Oklahoma told reporters as he left the meeting that he will run for House majority leader.
Republicans haven’t yet announced when a floor vote will take place, though the House is scheduled to come into session at 3 p.m.
Reps. Frank Lucas of Oklahoma, Ashley Hinson of Iowa and John James of Michigan gave nominating speeches for Scalise. His path to the nomination was smoothed when Republicans tabled a proposal by Texas Republican Chip Roy to change the rules on how a nominee was selected.
The other candidate was Ohio’s Jim Jordan, chair of the House Judiciary Committee.
Reps. Kelly Armstrong of North Dakota, Erin Houchin of Indiana and Mike Carey of Ohio nominated Jordan.
The new speaker will have several crises to address as soon as the swearing-in is over.
The first task will likely be addressing the situation in Israel, which is under an ongoing attack from Hamas and possibly other organizations.
Congress will need to approve supplemental funding expected to be requested by President Joe Biden, an issue that will garner strong bipartisan support. Biden has said he wants Congress to take “urgent action” on Israel’s security needs.
Scalise, if elected speaker, will need to work with the Democratic Senate to pass some type of government funding bill ahead of a Nov. 17 deadline. Additional aid to Ukraine could be attached to that package, or a bill carrying aid to Israel.
Scalise also would be tasked with fundraising, protecting centrist Republicans and wrangling far-right conservatives to support his agenda.
However, there are some GOP lawmakers who still plan to vote for Jordan on the House floor such as Rep. Max Miller of Ohio.
He said he’d back Jordan “because he’s not in leadership.”
“Trust has been shattered in that room,” Miller said. “The only way, in my opinion, that you regain that trust is with a whole new set of people.”
Ariana Figueroa contributed to this article
