Josh Earnest: Next Speaker Needs to ‘Tame the Forces’ of ‘Extreme Ideologues’

Thursday, commenting on the news that House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has dropped out of the race to become speaker, press secretary Josh Earnest said the next speaker will have to, “tame the forces” of the “extreme ideologues” in the Republican Party.

Earnest said, “It certainly is easy to poke fun at the chaos, but the fact is, the challenge that is facing the next Republican Speaker of the House, regardless of who it is, is the same challenge John Boehner faced, the same challenge Kevin McCarthy would have faced, and that is simply to unite a divided Republican caucus. There is a minority group of conservative Republican politicians that places their own extreme ideology ahead of everything else. And certainly ahead of effective governance of the country. But also, as of today, ahead of the  effective governance of the House Republican caucus. Somebody among the House Republicans will have to step forward and demonstrate an ability to either tame the forces of that, again small but vocal, group of extreme ideologues, or buck up the mainstream, or at least more mainstream, majority within the House Republicans.”

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