Kevin McCarthy was the House Speaker for the House of Representatives for the United States until he was voted out on Saturday 7th, October 2023 by the House. He served for 269 days or less than a year. It was a close vote, but he was voted out. This was due to him making deals with the other party to get their vote and he didn’t hold up his end of the deal.
The House Speaker is very important to our government. The House Speaker is third in line if the President and Vice President are killed or incapacitated. He is also necessary if the House of Representatives wants to do anything. He is in charge of the house and controls what happens there. He calls on people, puts bills and votes forward, and appoints people.
His rival Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida put the motion to vote him out of office. The vote was 216-210 in the decision to kick out McCarthy. They were mostly mad at him for not holding his end of the deals he made with people to get their votes because it took him 15 rounds to get voted in.
The Republican party could have voted for whoever they wanted because they have more people in the House of Representatives, but they are very divided and are arguing with each other over everything. If they had some sort of middle ground they could work together and get done what they want to get done. Mr. Ippolito, an 8th-grade teacher for team Cimmaron said “The House Speaker is one of the most important positions in our government because they are third in line for the president and they do their best to keep the House in order.”
Since he only served 269 days in office he had the third shortest term of all House Speakers. Rep. Patrick McHenry will take over as temporary House Speaker until they can get a permanent one. Jim Jordan and Steve Scalise are the two candidates to become the new permanent Speaker of the House. On multiple occasions, Kevin McCarthy mentioned he would step down early, but they kicked him out before he even did that. He was also the first House speaker to be voted out of office in a floor vote involving all representatives of the House.