GOP Rep Dent: Conservatives ‘Fragged’ McCarthy,’ ‘May Have to Assemble a Bipartisan Coalition’ to Elect Next Speaker

Thursday on MSNBC, in commenting on House Majority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) dropping out of the race for the Speaker of the House seat soon to be vacated by John Boehner (R-OH), Rep. Charlie Dent (R-PA) said conservatives in the House “fragged,’ Kevin McCarthy.

Identified as a moderate, Dent said, “It’s pretty obvious what happened. The same members wanted to take down John Boehner, I always said would try to frag the next guy. Well they just fragged Kevin McCarthy. Kevin McCarthy had a strong majority of votes among the House Republican conference. Did he have 180 votes or something closer to 210 votes. He did not have 218 votes. The concern was that if Kevin were to go on the House floor, present himself as a Speaker candidate, that he failed to get 218 points and would obviously be embarrassed and humiliated. I think that’s what largely drove this decision today. I didn’t speak to him prior, I didn’t know he was going to do this. I was just as shocked as anyone. But the challenge for our conference is quite simple. we need to assemble bipartisan coalitions to pass any important legislation around here. We may have to assemble a bipartisan coalition to elect the next Speaker of the House of  Representatives.”

He continued, “I have said that whoever is going to be the next Speaker should not appease this group of rejectionists, who have no interest in governing. they can simply not get to yes. the perfect will always be the enemy of the good to them. We just have to deal with the reality as it is.”

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