kevin mccarthy nowhere to be found. the leadership void in the gop is really absolutely astounding. >> it is. obviously, kevin mccarthy wants to be the speaker of the house should republicans win, and he knows he has a problem on his right flank. and he's trying not to rile them up. but what's being shown is a lack of leadership, a lack of

i want to play an old clip of kevin mccarthy. this is back when he was pretending to be a grown male adult. here he is condemning steve king's comments which were openly defending white nationalism. here he is. hard to believe this is the same guy. >> we know that kevin mccarthy -- >> first and foremost i came out at the very moment. that language has no place in america. i will not stand back as a leader of this party believing in this nation all are created equal that that stands or continues to stand and have any rule with us. >> is that the same guy? if steve king was around today, would he condemn him or what? >> what have they done with kevin mccarthy? bring him back. joy, i think the issue here is we call kevin mccarthy the republican leader but really, you know, you hear of republicans, the real power in the facto leader is your friend marjorie greene because for the simple notion that she commands a large enough because of her outrage she commands a large enough segment of the house republicans that kevin mccarthy can't

. >> congressional leaders nancy pelosi, kevin mccarthy, and chuck schumer joined other lawmakers on the steps of the u.s. capitol to remember the 800,000 lives lost to covid-19 in the united states. there was a moment of silence and vocals from the u.s. air force band. >> ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the united states air force band. >> ♪ shall we gather at the river where bright angels feet have trod ♪ yes, we'll gather by the river the beautiful, the beautiful river gather wiki by the river that flows by the throne of god ♪ we will walk and worship ever of the happy golden days yes, we'll gather at the river the beautiful, the beautiful river gather we at the river that flows by the throne of god soon we'll reach the shining river soon our pilgrimage we'll see soon our happy hearts will quiver with the melody of peace ♪ >> ladies and gentlemen, please join speaker nancy pelosi, senate majority leader charles e schumer, and house republican leader kevin mccarthy in a moment of silence in the remembrance of the more than 800,000 lives lost to the covid-19 virus. >> â

i hope -- i hope kevin mccarthy was listening. you know, kevin mccarthy, at one point, came out against donald trump after the insurrection and he has been paying for it ever since. he had to go to mar-a-lago to kiss the ring. he had to change his mind, and i don't think he wants to go through that again because as you point out, he wants to be speaker of the house and he thinks this is the way to get it. um, and so, i don't know if mccarthy is listening or not. perhaps, what we heard from omar tonight will give him an excuse because that's what it would be. would give him an excuse to come out and say, i don't like those voicemails. i don't like those tweets. rather than saying i don't like what boebert did and she needed to stop doing it. i mean, he needs to come out and criticize her. and, i you know, let's see if h has the guts to do it. what is the speakership worth if you don't have a party to lead? >> yeah, that's well said. thank you, both, very much. i appreciate you. >> can i make one more comment? >> yeah. sorry. >>> ne

but this is a problem for kevin mccarthy. if he goes after the trump-supported congresswoman, a congresswoman or member of the house very close to donald trump, he can enjoin trump's wrath. >> welcome to the window of the republican party generally. this is an acute example of what the entire party is dealing with if you look at primaries or people running statewide or just districts, and that is there's recognition inside the republican party you cannot win inside your party without former president trump's support and yet that u.s. kascauses problem particularly when you have to govern or lead. you guys have done great reporting, it's not jft marjorie taylor greene, contrary to the popular belief, there are still moderate republicans left -- not normal but traditional conservative republicans inside this conference that hate this, that recognize last week was literally the dumbest week on our timeline and that is a very, very high bar. if mccarthy can't get those individuals to vote for him or he leans one way or another, h

here now is minority leader kevin mccarthy. leader mccarthy, welcome. how significant, how surprising was yesterday's announcement with bret baier? >> it was surprising but if you listen to joe manchin, one thing about him he has been exactly and consistently honest all the way through. he said he would and even signed an agreement he would not go higher than the $1.8 trillion. will made a fatal mistake and nancy pelosi made a fatal mistake. they all said they wouldn't pass a bill in the house until it already had been conferenced in the senate and make sure it passed the senate. she had all of her democrats and there were no joe manchins over there that would stand up. only one would. and now they have voted for the 87,000 irs agents to spy on you. they they voted to open the border and make people legal citizens when they came here illegally. they secreted to take away work requirements. this is a very bad vote. but joe manchin kept his word. now, i didn't think it would happen. i thought the odds were that they would get something through. this is a

. >> let's listen to more of what congressman had to say, this time about kevin mccarthy. >> kevin mccarthy on the other hand, has not said a word about anything. except for, that donald trump is probably the greatest president to ever exist, and kevin mccarthy himself, i think. made donald trump relevant again, when two weeks after january six or, so he went back down to mar-a-lago, and brought him back to political life, by putting his arm around him, taking that picture. and basically sending a signal to the rest of the republicans who are pretty quiet at the, moment that we have to get back on the trump train. he bears responsibility for. that history books will not be kind to him. >> we do know that kevin mccarthy was in some communication with the white house, at this point we on january six, we don't know whether it was text, or voice, the boys communication will be harder to get an accurate reading on. >> kevin mccarthy was a very effective start bursts order for donald trump. not so effective when it comes to showing integrity or honor. but we do know from impeachment number two, t

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kevin mccarthy on the other hand has not said a word about anything. except for that donald trump is probably the greatest president to ever exist and kevin mccarthy himself i think made donald trump relevant again when two weeks after january 6 or so he went back down to mar-a-lago and brought him back to political life by putting his arm around him, taking that picture, and sending a signal to the rest of the republicans who were pretty quiet at this moment that we got to get back on the trump train. he bears responsibility for that. i don't think history books will be kind to him. >> we do know kevin mccarthy was in some communication with the white house but at this point we don't know whether it was text or voice. the voice communication of course will be harder to get an accurate reading on. >> kevin mccarthy was a very effective star burst sorter for donald trump. not so effective when it comes to showing integrity or honor but we know from impeachment number two that kevin mccarthy relayed to a republican from washington the conversation he had

point out, maybe not the biggest fan of kevin mccarthy and how did you feel watching his eight and a half hour speech the other night? >> it was torture. >> seth: yeah. [ laughter ] >> it was my first moron-a-thon. [ applause ] and i kept thinking if this is his way of punishing paul gosar, why make the rest of us suffer >> seth: right, i have to sit through it >> it was rambling, it was incoherent and the strange thing about it is, if you're going to filibuster something, do you really want to filibuster early childhood education, quality child care, hearing aids for seniors? the most vigorous effort to combat climate change? is that really what you really want to try to filibuster? >> seth: well, i wonder why it is he would do that. because build back better, the elements of it are very popular. these are things people want and yet, the republican party does seem like there is some sort of electoral advantage to running against it do you feel like people are going to get excited about this bill and do you feel like it's something the democratic party is going to be able to run on a

is in the wrong here and so are republicans who are sticking up for her or republican leaders like kevin mccarthy who is sitting by doing effectively nothing about this bigotry and therefore enabling and encouraging it. >> she wants attention and mayhem. so these are just some of the adjectives that lawmakers are using lately to describe each other and public official liar, tattle tale, grifter, communist, murderer, suicide bomber, terrorist, sympathizer, buffoon.

and kevin mccarthy was actively urging his members to oppose it. part of the reason for the split is the different nature and makeups of the conferences. mitch mcconnell dealing with a 50-seat minority. he has been forced to cut deals. on the house side, the minority party is rarely needed for votes. the other big factor as you alluded to is donald trump. mitch mcconnell and mccarthy have completely different views about the party. they see trump as crucial to winning back the majority but winning speaker one day. they are likely to vote against the bipartisan infrastructure deal. some republicans are starting to sound the alarm about the two gop leaders being on opposite pages. listen to what a texas republican told me yesterday. he said, quote, we better stick together. it's imperative that republicans all march in one direction. this is training for, hopefully, next session. so clearly this divide between mitch mcconnell and kevin mccarthy could foreshadow governing challenges if republicans win both champ p be chambers. >>> speaker nancy pelosi

a future in that guy kevin mccarthy who essentially, i can't call him spineless. he's a bucket of goop. you can't pick it up. there is nothing there. he doesn't have any ability to stand up to these people, this peanut galley who are now literally putting representative omar's life in danger. what would it be like with him as speaker? >> no, it's intolerable and it cannot happen and that's why in our statement that several of us chairs of the different caucuses, the black caucus, the progressive caucus, hispanic caucus, asian-american caucus put out, we said kevin mccarthy is either unwilling or unable to control his caucus and that shows that he cannot be in leadership of his caucus much less in leadership of the house of representatives. joy, it goes to the fundamental brokeness of the republican party today. they do not even have basic decency, they can't even have a conversation about what is right and wrong. it is wrong to call a member of congress a suicide bomber. it is wrong to joke about that publicly. it endangers their lives and the muslims that work on

the writer -- marjorie taylor greene also says kevin mccarthy -- kevin mccarthy called her out. this is leader mccarthy speaking about the democrats' agenda in the house. [video clip] >> in the last 12 months, what have they been able to do with one party rule? the $5 trillion socialist spending bill is unpopular with the american public, so unpopular -- you do not have to take the republicans' words for it, just look to their own conference. the congresswoman from virginia admitted she even avoided bringing it up when she is back home. leadership said they just need to get out and explain it more, and she says she avoids even talking about it. how's democrats -- house democrats, very exciting action taking place this week, they scheduled the least number of voting days in modern history. you take next year and this year, 202 days, the least amount we have been able to do in the last decade. when republicans were in the majority come i think we were averaging about 250. should we be upset about that or should we be relieved? if they are here less, maybe they can do less damage.

kevin mccarthy has a problem. to my mind his being silent on all these things, he might think might help him, republicans get the majority. but if he thinks he can control them, if indeed republicans become the majority, he's got another thing coming, doesn't he? >> you know, for years when mike and i were involved in the party, we always said that it was a mistake to try to negotiate with terrorists. and that's what kevin mccarthy's trying to do. if these republicans take over the house next year, which odds are they are, they're going to put kevin mccarthy's head on a spike. they're not going to elect him speaker. he isn't what they want to be. he is like a chairman who wants to make everybody happy. it's not going to work. they want a warrior, somebody like a jim jordan, to be speaker of the house. it's not going to be some domesticated nice version of republicanism, if they take over the house. it's going to be people like marjorie taylor greene are going to be running the house of representatives of the great

did you write a story about kevin mccarthy in the book and basically call him a liar in the book. what kind of figure do you think that he would be? >> the lack of character. if kevin mccarthy were ever to become speaker, donald trump would become speaker and he would into disagree ever and he would have an outside party running. i tell in the book mccarthy and i were on a plane in washington in 2010. the demand term ise about six months away and we were having a conversation and i said to the democrats would win. we would move our separate ways and unbeknownst to me everybody knew and he sat next to adam schiff and he admitted that republicans were going to win the midterms. i didn't know about this until in the morning and i was just astounded. i said firstut of all, having a private conversation but you know i said the opposite of what you told the press and he says but you know how it goes. that's not how i i operate. you cannot have someone with such little regard for the truth speaking for the house and indeed, this is one of the most destructive things of the last several y

how is, if at all, minority leader kevin mccarthy handling this public feud? it was a little quiet in the beginning when it was dealing with boebert and her comments about ilhan omar. where do you stand this morning. >> reporter: kevin mccarthy is working behind the scenes. he knows this is a huge distraction for republicans. they would rather keep the focus on the biden agenda. the head of the gop arm said we should not be the headline here. let's stay focused on our goals. as manu raju and i reported yesterday, kevin mccarthy hauled in greene and mace for private meetings where he told them to knock it off. after the meeting i caught up with greene who said she would support a primary challenge to mace. and mace said, all i want to say about marjorie taylor greene is bless her effing heart. democrats say this behavior from the extremists in the party like lauren boebert is completely unacceptable. take a listen to what ilhan omar had to say yesterday at a press conference about boebert. >> when a sitting member, a colleague a member of the jihad squad and fa

kevin mccarthy has not condemned racist comments by one republican lawmaker. and trying to get the republicans to stop fighting among themselves is failing and failing big time. marjorie taylor greene is one he asked to step back. she asked him to play the trump card. honestly, i love that man, she said. unfortunately nancy mace doesn't. i will be very very supportive of a primary challenger. >> if you say something bad and crazy, you say something extreme, you're going to raise money. that's the only reason she does that. she is a grifter of the first order and she does it to raise money. she takes advantage of vulnerable americans and vulnerable conservatives and makes promises she can't keep. >> fact check, true. however, there are a number of issues to get at here. number one, the bigger issue is the leader of the house republicans has not publicly condemned a vile racist comment. he thinks it's best to deal with this privately. that's not leadership. >> it isn't. again, it wasn't that long ago when kevin mccarthy was kicking people off committees for thei

will kevin mccarthy rein in the warring factions? >>> good morning. this is "early start." i'm christine romans. >> i'm laura jarrett. it's about 33 minutes past the hour here in new york. it's h it's time for our top stories to keep an eye on. >>> a sophomore is in custody after killing three students and wounding eight others at a high school in michigan. three students are in critical condition this morning. the suspect is on suicide watch at a juvenile detention facility. >>> all travelers in the united states may have to be tested one day before their flight. the biden administration considering testing all travelers including u.s. citizens after they arrive in the u.s. right now the cdc is expanding surveillance at four major u.s. airports to check for omicron. >>> a federal judge in louisiana has halted the biden administration's vaccine mandate covering many health care workers. now, this order applies nationwide. it is the third court order blocking various federal vaccine mandates just since monday morning. >>> jury selection underway in the trial of former minnes

and big question here is how about kevin mccarthy. we know kevin mccarthy had a key conversation with donald trump on january 6th. the committee has not formally approached kevin mccarthy yet. you wonder if they're trigger shy because they can do the math and figure out that a year from now he might well be the speaker. but the committee needs to look inside congress as well. >> a lot of attention has been on something that steve bannon said on his radio show the day before january 6th and i want to just remind everyone what it was. >> all hell is going to break loose tomorrow. just understand this. all hell is going to break loose tomorrow. it is not going to happen like you think it's going to happen. it is going to be quite extraordinarily different. and all i can say is strap in. the war room, a posse, you have made this happen and tomorrow it is game day. so strap in. >> game day was one name for it. and, of course, the next morning, trump held that rally on the ellipse, he called for people to march to the capitol and implicated

it's kevin mccarthy. if he can't stand up to these folks in his own party, how are you going to lead that party? leadership starts with actually leading, not following the fringes of your party. >> ayman? >> all right, so, for courage, i'm going to keep it in the realm of law and order, keith ellison and the way he prosecuted derek chauvin because when this trial began or when this case began, there were a lot of questions as to whether or not minneapolis was going to be able to do the right thing and bring the right charges and if you remember, he stepped in and was able to kind of bring that all on track and get the conviction of derek chauvin, which was a very important moment for this country. so, i think that is real leadership and courage. >> and his team did an excellent job. >> all the way down. >> one of the things i have to say, because as you know, i worked very closely with the family of george floyd and all the protests, is that he -- keith ellison stepped in but then he stepped back and let

>> i absolutely think kevin mccarthy showed what the republican party is today. it is an authoritarian party trafficking hate and he is unable, or inwilling, to calculate that and i show how different this republican party is. this republican party doesn't stand for party principles anymore. they stand for, essentially, you know, trafficking in the big lie of the election, to giving a platform to people who are clearly trafficking in hate and that is just who they are. so i think we, as democrats, need to show exactly how different we are. we are the pro democracy party, the party that cares about people, cares about covid, getting shots in arms and getting people vaccinated happen we have, under president biden, brought down unemployment over two points, 2.5%, a quarter more than what the cfo was predicting, and provided six million new jobs in 10 months. that is the difference. >> representtive, do you believe speaker pelosi will get done what omar wants and believes pelosi will get done? >> i believe she will. i haven't had a conversation with her in the past

or do you think it could be more moderate folks and kevin mccarthy may become the speaker? >> well, look. i think that kevin mccarthy is actually so weak as a leader that is serving him within the house caucus and so i don't see an overthrow of the house caucus for lauren boebert or whatever is going to be running for speaker of the house next time and winning. i think that what you've seen over the past year is kevin mccarthy when he needs to just steps aside, lets them, you. >> advance their crazy. lets them advance their conspiracy theories and he demonstrates he is not going to try to fight with them or punish them or control them in the way paul ryan and john boehner did. that is what ended up being the death nell of those two former republican leaders in the house. they were seen as too hostile to the then insurgent tea party part of the caucus which is now, you know, a maga tea party conspiratorial monster that has grown even wilder since back then. mccarthy has no interest in a fight with them. i think he'll be able to stay as leader of the party but they are going

that seems to be what's happening with kevin mccarthy. he tells them to knock it off and they either do kind of, you saw what congresswoman boebert did, i'm so sorry and then go about her business and do what she was criticized for in the first place or they just don't listen to him at all and they go marjorie taylor greene. called trump and talked about having a challenger to nancy mace this week. >> marjorie taylor greene says she is the mainstream of the base of the republican party. she's not some extremist. and the truth of the matter is i don't know if that's right, no offense. >> listen, part of the reason kevin mccarthy doesn't want to act is because he's afraid of donald trump and he's also afraid of the base. marjorie taylor greene, as well as boebert are pleasing donald trump and getting all sorts of kudos from other members of the base and other members of the party because of what they have said. i think one of the problems in the republican party, and i'm quoting colin powell here, there's a dark vain of intol vance in the p

you remember kevin mccarthy's speech when gosar was censured? >> rules for thee but not for me. >> the members he singled out included representative omar, the very target of boebert's insults. it was omar who tweeted it was israel who hypnotized the world and said it's all about the benjamins, baby, in reference to a pro-israel lobbying group. at least omar issued a robust apology then. nevertheless, should republicans take the house in 2022, how long before it's omar on the receiving end of censure finished by house speaker kevin mccarthy? sometimes the silent treatment is the worst punishment of all. that's my take. reach out to me via social media this hour, whether you agree or disagree and i'll share some responses during the course of the program. let's bring in a democrat in congress, representative conor lamb from pennsylvania, now running for the u.s. senate. congressman, thanks for being here. you heard what i just had to say. what's your response? >> i think the first thing to point out is that we, democrats writ large, are in no way

it's kevin mccarthy. if he can't stand up to these folks in his own party, how are you going to lead that party? lead -- leadership starts with actually leading, not following the fringes of your party. >> ayman? >> so for courage, i am going to keep it in the realm of law and order. keith ellison and the way he prosecuted derek chauvin because when this trial began or when this case began, there were a lot of questions as to whether or not minneapolis was going to be able to do the right thing and bring the right charges and if you remember, he stepped in and was able to kind of bring that all on track and get the conviction of derek chauvin which was a very important moment for this country. so i think that is real leadership. >> excellent job. one of the things i have to say because as you know, i worked very closely with the family of george floyd and all of the protests is that he -- kooegtd keith ellison stepped in but then stepped back and let his team and blackwell, attorney blackwell, who had nev

kevin mccarthy, do you have any confidence that he will take any sort of action and push back against lauren boebert and the kind of things she's said? >> so historically it's always been the caucus. speaker pelosi made no -- had no qualms about stripping congressman rangel of his authority as ways and means chair when he was censured. so the fact that kevin mccarthy is unwilling to do that suggests that these fringe members of his party control him, that he has no ability to control them, that he has a precarious hold on his caucus because of his bid to try to become speaker. in many respects he has a ring in his nose now and the marjorie tailor greens and the lauren boeberts are pulling him around, and the more outrageous they get, the less able he is to respond. >> isn't it extraordinary, kevin mccarthy has been gunning for speaker for a long time and yet matt gaetz is saying donald trump would make a good speaker. that's a conversation for another time. thank you very much, jackie speier. >>> meantime, 36 hours of horror. survivors reflect after friday's devastating tornadoes. nur

that's what we see in kevin mccarthy's house. >> and the racism. we have a great panel to talk about all of this. the host of "way too early," jonathan lemire, donny deutsche, mara gaye, it's great to have all of you this morning. >> the party of life, please, it's a joke. i heard people say it before that republicans believe that life against conception but end at childbirth. it's never more true than now. >> you interestingly frame what could be an overall position for democrats. that kind of irony of what you talked about is interesting, usually when you talk, i am like what are you talking about? this one really hit home. it's really thoughtful and when you think about across the board, lack of life or certainly a lack of cherishing of life. i think democrats going forward, the way they fight this is they need to stick to their facts, and stick to the economy how it's getting better for everyone. stick to the granularity of both of the bills going through. you get into a culture war, the problem is democrats don't know how to fight it properly.

kevin mccarthy joins us now. i think what this has revealed to a lot of us is how much fat is in the federal workforce, how many people are truly essential and how many people can be gradually sent off into the sunset. administration is asking that. how many people are telecommuting or working because it's not working for the american public. let me give you one example. and the va there is more than 256,000 veteran benefit claims. think about that. the irs in recent report shows they only answer the phone 14% of the time but you've got the white house bragging about the federal workforce, at 92% had one dosage of the vaccine so they've been vaccinated why can't they get picked work. we just show the democrats are not working on their policies not. it is not what the workforce of the federal government is happening in the democratic caucus. there are members of the democratic caucus from the moment they put in proxy voting in may of 2020 that have only been back one time. they've never been back. >> isn't this go

kevin mccarthy is so desperate to be speaker that he is working with his ku klux klan caucus to look aside and allow violent targeting of woc members of congress. this cannot be ignored. the comments come as we learn "new york magazine" has provided essays on her focusing on the rare authenticity and the role her beauty plays. kat timpf is a fox nation host and co-host of gut field and quite lovely. that's not the actmen that people who voted for her are looking for. >> as a piece of literature i'm not sure i'm interested in reading a fawning, perfectly fawning profile or series of thing about anybody. except me. everybody feels that way about themselves. but to read something you want to be a bit more dynamic than that than just a book of how she not only is perfect but looks perfect. i can't imagine that being an interesting read. >> harris: what do you make of the whole idea with her throwing seriously called the caucus among the republicans the kkk. >> i don't think it helps ilhan omar at all. i think you should condemn the death threats against anybody and her but you don't have

as long as we have the divide between nancy pelosi and kevin mccarthy in the house it is hopeless, the chinese know is, they are, what should we a, delighted to see something like the january 6 investigation, and 1619 project that stirs up internal american paralysis about china, the chinese know this good for them. they have a lot of analysts and senior officials with masters and phd's from american universities, they speak english, they know how to manipulate our system, we're not prepared, nobody in top level of biden administration speaks chinese, you hear them mispronouncing the chinese leaders name, it is ignore an americans -- ignore an americans against the highly sophisticate chinese. president trump tried to stop this, but the biden administration is giving it rhetorical commentary, that is about all. all. >> you know. michael pillsbury, you look at reaction of this badge to rush administration to russia and to middle east, begging iran to come to the table. yet iran is thumbing their nose at them. and chinese and first meeting with our secretary of state, and so fourth, they

>> yes, kevin mccarthy is a liar and a coward, she's absolutely right. he would like to say boebert issued an apology. in politics, whether it was an apology or not, it wasn't contrite, and that's the basis of omar's complaint against mccarthy. right now mccarthy doesn't have the votes in his own caucus to be speaker so he play indicates boebert and greene and others. if the republicans end up winning 40 to 50 seats, he'll abandon boebert and greene then because he doesn't need them, he'll have enough votes in the larger republican caucus. ilhan omar is exactly right. >> just this week alone, don, in the house you have twitter feuds between marjorie taylor greene and nancy mace in the senate. a group of republicans held up a major defense bill and nearly forced a government shutdown because they wanted to stop vaccine mandates. is that what we can expect if republicans take back the congress in 2022? >> it depends on what david just said, whether or not the majority of seats will be taking up by crazies and whether or not mccarthy will pat the crazies on

house minority leader kevin mccarthy joins us now. congressman, i think what this has revealed to a lot of us is how much fat is really in the federal workforce. how many people are truly essential and how many people can be gradually sent off into the sunset. >> you're correct. i'm asking them not. how many people are teleworking and how many people are actually working because it's not working for the american public. may give you an example. in the e.u., there is more than 266,000 veterans benefit claims. that are backlogged. the irs in a recent report shows that they only answered the phone 14% of the time. but you have the white house bragging about the federal workforce at a 92% have had one dosage of the vaccine. so if they have been vaccinated, why can't they get back to work? we just showed that the democrats aren't working on the policies. and it's just not the workforce of the federal government. it is happening in the democratic caucus themselves. you know there are members of the democratic caucus from the moment they put

>> i think that kevin mccarthy is actually so weak as a leader. so i don't see an overthrow of the house caucus for lauren boebert who is going to be running for speaker of the house. i think that would you have seen over the past year is that kevin mccarthy winds when he needs to. he will step aside. let them advance their conspiracy. and he demonstrates that he's not going to try to fight with them, fight with, them control them in the way that john baer did. that is what's ended up being the death of them. they were seen as too hostile in the surge and tea party part of the caucus which is now a maga tea party conspiratorial monstrous that has grown even wilder since back then. but he has no interest to fight with them. so i think that he will be able to stay as the leader of the party. and the republicans will take over, and next year for sure. >> so quickly, what is the future of any agenda that the president would want to put forward? >> the only agenda that really matters is voting rights and preservation of democracy. and that is in seriou

leadership condemns it. >> that's not kevin mccarthy's approach right now. he's making the bet. the wind is blowing in their direction and they've got to keep things tamped down and we'll have the majority next year. the longer-term issue is you don't make these issues go away by tamping them down. they're going to come back and bite you if and when you do have the majority. and i think that's perhaps what he's not taking into account. >> he's trying to get there first, and you're not going to tell them no tot feed the beast. i don't think anybody is waiting for a particular profile enkurjsment in terms of somebody's going to speak outed on this or that. i don't remember that being his m.o. but the issue is, again, creating consequences. do people in this district want to have people stripped of power or are we in a political environmental where being media-friendly, being in front of the camera constantly is more powerful than holding any seat. >> we were told committees are stupid. she doesn't care. >> you're not there to govern. >> that gets to the heart of the tension in the

probably the greatest president to ever exist, and kevin mccarthy himself i think made donald trump relevant again when two weeks after january 6th or so, he went back down to mar-a-lago and brought him back to political life by putting his arm around him, taking that picture, and basically sending the signal to the rest of the republicans that were pretty quiet at this moment, that we got to get back on the trump train, and he bears responsibility for that. i don't think history books are going to be kind to him. >> okay, we're almost out of time, but one more question. you won a big decision, the committee did, the appeals court, d.c. circuit on that executive privilege case to get all those white house documents that are housed in the national archives. the committee gave trump 14 days -- the court gave trump 14 days to appeal. that 14th day i think is christmas eve. do you expect the supreme court is going to take that up, and do you think you're going to get those documents? >> i think it's possible the supreme court could pick it up because it's so important, but i hope for an

what more violence needs to happen for kevin mccarthy to grow a backbone and put this under control? or is he going to continue to be the pus lamb nous coward held hostage by these out-of-control banshees? what's the point of being speaker and leader if you've got no leader and no spine. >> we saw the violence on january 6th. ana nah regard row, thanks so much. >>> thanks so much to all of you for joining today. a busy news day. i'm jim sciutto. >> i'm erica hill. "at this hour with kate bolduan" comes your way after this short break. i brought in ensure max protein, with thirty grams of protein. those who tried me felt more energy in just two weeks! (sighs wearily) here i'll take that! (excited yell) woo-hoo! ensure max protein. with thirty grams of protein, one gram of sugar, and nutrients to support immune health. new projects means new project managers. you need to hire. i need indeed. indeed you do. when you sponsor a job, you immediately get your shortlist of quality candidates, whose resumes on indeed match your job criteria. visit indeed.com/hire and get started today. what's

kevin mccarthy is on the shot here, and he is calculating enough to trying to this. he is hoping for a big enough republican win next november in the congressional midterms that he does not have to worry about the marjorie taylor greene, the matt case, and the others, whose votes he will have for the -- >> indeed, the minority leader is once again trying to -- french members of his party will go back to that illuminate as democrats talk of punishing another one of them. politico as these details about private meeting mccarthy held today with his caucus, writing, quote, he would not give oxygen to those he suggested were seeking attention, thank the majority of members who have it made themselves the spotlight of headlines, and stressed that the house is a serious deliberative body not a junior high. we should mention mccarthy has yet to publicly condemn any of his members, aside from liz cheney who has expressed an interest and saving democracy. thankfully, still with us, two gentlemen interested in the same goal, eugene robinson and mike murphy. mike, i picture kevi

kevin mccarthy tried to make that guy part of the investigation into what happened on january six in the lead up to it. but in its letter to the congressman, the committee points out that jim jordan's involvement extends way beyond whatever conversations he had with trump on the six, before or after, during. he was a crucial player in planning the coup attack that led to didn't section in the first place quote, we also must learn about the activities that led to the attack on january six. public reporting suggest that you may have information about meetings with white house officials and the den president about strategies for overturning the results of the 2020 election. to be honest, the committee is underselling jordan's involvement here. new york times reports two days after the ap called the election for joe biden, jordan huddled with top trump staff at campaign headquarters in quote, the group settled on a strategy that would become a blueprint for mr. trump supporters in congress, hammer home the idea that the election was tainted and that it -- bolster the claims of allegation

what would you want to say to kevin mccarthy doing nothing about this? >> yeah, i mean, this is why so many muslims across the country have reached out to our office and to other members of congress because they know that when anti muslim hatred and islam phobia is unaddressed it's the muslim community that ends up paying for it. i can't imagine, you know, just how incredibly dangerous it is to move now from the jokingly way that she was trafficking her islam phobic troops to now explicitly identifying a member of congress as a terrorist and the kind of violence that that can incite. i mean, if you were at home and you were hearing that, you would be alarmed to think that there is a terrorist in the house of representatives. it should be alarming to everyone and i just want to make people understand how dangerous the usage of her words can be because i am afraid that somebody like the people who have been leaving voice mails in my office will feel compelled to come and take out the terrorists and that is not only endangering my life but endangering other

. >>> i don't think kevin mccarthy has the votes. what we are seeing is the flish flopping around before he dies. it's it that scenario. kevin mccarthy is only shot here and calculating enough to try to do this. he is hoping for a big enough republican win next november in the congressional midterms that he does not have to worry about the marjorie taylor greenes, the matt gaetz and others who votes he won't have for the speaker ship. >> indeed, the minority leader is trying to quiet trouble from fringe members of his party. we will go back to that word in a minute as democrats talk of punishing another one of them. a private meeting mccarthy held today with his caucus. he said he would not give oxygen to those he suggested earp seeking attention, thanked the majority of members who haven't made themselves the spotlight of head line and stressed that the house is a serious deliberative body, not a junior high. mccarthy has yet to publicly condemn any of the members aside from liz cheney, who has expressed an interest in saving democr

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but the democratic voter likes them, that is not the case, but mitch mcconnell and kevin mccarthy, so if any one kim below, what in our polling is an unprecedented lead for republicans on the generic ballad . it's their leadership and they're on their own conference. generally speaking, democratic voters feel represented republicans don't. so the, it, there could, they could get themselves into a situation like they did in georgia on january 5th, which is basically where republicans sat it out. many base republicans and central and southern georgia in a $200000.00 plus just decided i'm not going to vote because i feel like for once they have to be taught a lesson. but again, in a midterm like this in a 1st term incumbent midterm, it would really have to be, peter would have to be significant. they, it would have to be a significant betrayal. and i'm, and i haven't seen that yet, although, and i haven't, i haven't exactly seen representation either. yeah. well, you never can underestimate how the republicans can snatch. and one of the things that we, when i look at the generic poll, wh

but mitch mcconnell and kevin mccarthy, so if anyone, kim, below, what in our polling is an unprecedented lead for republicans on the generic balin, it's their leadership and they're on their own conference. generally speaking, democratic voters feel represented republicans don't. so the, it, there could, they could get themselves into a situation like they did in georgia on january 5th, which is basically where republicans sat it out many base republicans in central and southern georgia. you know, $200000.00 plus just decided i'm not going to vote because i feel like for once they have to be taught a lesson. but again, in a midterm like this in a 1st term incumbent midterm, it would really have to be, peter would have to be significant. they, it would have to be a significant betrayal. and i'm, and i haven't seen that yet. although in ivan ivan, exactly seem representation either. yeah, well you never can underestimate how the republicans can snatch you. one of the things that we, when i look at the generic poll, when i look at the ok, the package of buying isn't popular, doesn't surpris

it is fascinating that kevin mccarthy wanted jim jordan to be on the actual committee. >> congressman jordan says there is more context and we are entitled to that and he is entitled to that. he should release it. it is his text. my guess is he has access to his own text. we should know fg. he should tell us this. i draw a big distinction between fox news personalities who by the way were saying the right thing in private saying please make him stop the violence and a congressman. a congressman swore an oath to the constitution. cable news talking heads don't swear an oath to the constitution. we hope they are loyal to it. mr. jordan took an oath to uphold the constitution and it may be, i really do want to see the context. he might have said, isn't this crazy? he is entitled to his whole defense but he could offer it to us right now. give us the context, congressman jordan. because that is getting pretty close to undermining the constitutional order here. by the way, not only throwing out electoral votes but the millions of votes of american citizens who cast them that determined tho

bennie thompson said an invitation is on the table for the house republican leader, kevin mccarthy. do you know if he's been formally asked? and what do you expect? >> i'm not going to get into the individuals that we have had interviews with or have asked to come before us. but what i can tell you is anyone, especially a lawmaker who has taken an oath, like i have, to protect and defend our constitution and our democracy, should come forward with any facts or any conversations that could be helpful to aid in our investigation. >> but kevin mccarthy has not -- he's not cooperated with the investigation, has he? he hasn't spoken with your committee, has he? >> he has not. and what i'm saying is it's going to be important for anyone with details of the facts and circumstances of january 5th and january 6th to share them with the committee. people, especially lawmakers, should be willing to do this voluntarily. but as we have seen in -- >> do you think it would behoove kevin mccarthy to -- i don't mean to cut you off. i'm very short on time. do you think it would behoove hum to do it v