It must have been an exceedingly strange day for House Majority Whip Tom Emmer. At this point 24 hours ago, the Minnesota Republican was the clear favorite to win his party’s nomination for House speaker. Shortly after noon, Emmer succeeded and became the speaker-designate. Four hours later, he was the former speaker-designate.
And as the day came to an end, the GOP leader watched as the guy he defeated earlier in the day suddenly took his place.
When was the last time this happened in American politics? Never. It’s literally never happened.
But as congressional Republicans move on, and Speaker-designate Mike Johnson prepares for a floor vote, it’s worth appreciating why, exactly, Emmer lost — or more accurately, lost on the heels of winning.
If, after his successful intraparty election, some scandalous new detail emerged to derail his candidacy, that would at least make some sense. But that’s not what happened. Rather, the Minnesotan was derailed by his far-right colleagues, who concluded that Emmer simply wasn’t far-right enough.
At face value, these attitudes were, and are, counterintuitive. After all, House Republicans chose Emmer to lead the National Republican Congressional Committee for the 2020 election cycle. Pleased with his performance, members re-elected him to a second term as NRCC chair for the 2022 election cycle. Again impressed, House Republicans chose Emmer to serve as House majority whip — the #3 position in the party’s leadership team — less than a year ago.
So how is it that this same congressman faced insurmountable opposition from so many of his own GOP colleagues?
Part of the problem was the fact that Emmer voted to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election, which fueled Donald Trump’s contempt for the Minnesotan. (The fact that Emmer supported a ridiculous lawsuit to overturn Trump’s defeat apparently wasn’t good enough.)
But that wasn’t the only problem. HuffPost reported:
Minnesota Republican Rep. Tom Emmer’s support for legalizing gay marriage was a major reason his Tuesday tenure as the GOP’s speaker-designate lasted only four hours. … Emmer voted for the Respect for Marriage Act in 2022, which turned the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2015 ruling legalizing gay marriage into national law. His vote, which came after years of opposing gay marriage, put him in line with the overwhelming majority of Americans.
Note, 39 House Republicans voted for the Respect for Marriage Act, which enshrines federal protections for marriages of same-sex and interracial couples, and which was the result of bipartisan negotiations. But this became a major sticking point for some Republicans. In fact, by some accounts, Republican Rep. Rick Allen of Georgia, disappointed that Emmer wasn’t anti-gay enough, told the then-speaker-designate that he needed “to get right with Jesus.” Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia made related comments to NBC News, complaining not only about Emmer’s mainstream attitudes on LGBTQ+ issues, but also his previous support for deciding American presidential elections by popular vote instead of the electoral college. Marjorie Taylor Greene: I voted against Tom Emmer because he voted to certify the 2020 election and voted to codify marriage equality pic.twitter.com/UwrtAtEGtU Kevin McCarthy’s, Steve Scalise’s, Jim Jordan’s, and Tom Emmer’s bids for speaker all failed for different reasons, but the case against Emmer deserves to be seen as the most offensive.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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