Both Republican and Democratic senators emphasize that any successor to Kevin McCarthy will inherit the divided government that befell him — with another shutdown looming.
Both Republican and Democratic senators emphasize that any successor to Kevin McCarthy will inherit the divided government that befell him — with another shutdown looming.
Moderate Republicans, including the 18 from districts Biden won, are told by the Senate that falling in line with their radical colleagues will take them no closer to governing. Will it work? Perhaps not, but the attempt was made.
They lose if they do. If they work with the moderate republicans they can get a moderate republican All democrats + 30 republicans is enough to elect a moderate speaker, while all republicans will only elect a speaker less moderate.
Doing so amounts to switching their party affiliation. The GOP will totally abandon them and primary them so hard in the next election. It will entirely end their political career, and is likely to attract all manner of death threats and probably actual attempts on their lives. Republicans are super into stochastic terrorism these days.
You need 30 republicans so they have enough cover each other. You are right the minimum number is 6, but it would be stupid for the 6 republicans to follow that plan - they will just be told to switch parties even though overall they better fit republicans (or so we can assume though this may be false). 30 is in fact small, but if you find 30 who go for it you can probably get 70 more. I doubt you would get all democrats to go for this, so that is more republicans you need.