On January 7th, Kevin McCarthy was officially voted in as Speaker of the House for the Republican Party, but what took to get there was chaos. As the Capital was in hysteria, the Republican Party created a  divide that elongated the voting process for four days which caused drama and created a historical event.

Nominated to represent the Republican Party as speaker of the house, McCarthy could not get the votes needed to secure his spot. According to CBS News, McCarthy was required to win with “218 votes on the floor if all members are present” but from January 3rd to January 6th he kept coming up short due to The members of the House Freedom Caucus. The members of this group would not vote present or nay because they felt with him in this position he would not adhere to listening to their conservative ideology. On Twitter, North Carolina Representative of the 8th district Dan Bishop posted a statement claiming that “Kevin McCarthy is not the right candidate to be speaker of the house. He has perpetuated the Washington status quo that makes this body one of the most unsuccessful and unpopular institutions in the country.” But after  saying this his vote changed closer to the end of the voting session along with many others. 

McCarthy had 15 voting sessions instead of just having 1 session, making McCarthy the first politician in a century to lose by his own house in the first voting session and not reaching the minimum amount of votes of 218 until his 15th voting session.  According to the New York Times, after being sworn in as the 188th Speaker of the House, McCarthy started with “that was easy, huh?”