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McCarthy to Swear in Members of Congress and Push Through 55 Page Rules Package All on Friday Night If He Wins: Report
If House Republican Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy is able to win enough votes to catapult him into the Speaker’s chair at the end of Friday night’s 10 PM vote – and Fox News reports they have been assured he will – he is expected to immediately be sworn in and then swear in Members of Congress, then force through a vote on the rules package, which currently does not detail any but one of the currently secret concessions he has made to secure votes from the extremist “Never Kevin” caucus.
McCarthy says he is certain he will win on the next vote, which would be the fourteenth.
Kevin McCarthy tells CNN’s @mkraju he believes he will have the votes to be elected House Speaker tonight.
Asked how he knows that, McCarthy responds, “Because I count.” pic.twitter.com/DsCfQHrQH0
— The Recount (@therecount) January 6, 2023
He has not, however, revealed all the secret promises he has made to the insurrectionists in order to gain the gavel, but presidential historian Michael Beschloss says it’s “essential” to find out.
“Essential to know exactly what secret concessions McCarthy has made to flip House Republicans who had been strenuously opposing him.”
The Daily Beast’s Washington Bureau Chief, Matt Fuller, agrees.
“Hey, you know what seems conspicuous? That we don’t know EXACTLY what conservatives got for their votes,” he tweeted. “GOP leaders aren’t saying and neither are conservatives. It’s almost like no one wants the rest of the conference to know…”
“Does anyone even know what’s in the rules package at this exact moment?” he asks. “How soon after they elect a speaker is the House holding votes on the rules package? A good harbinger for all those procedure complaints…”
He’s correct. And it’s not good.
The rules package is 55 pages, and if McCarthy forces it through immediately after the swearing-in, some could argue he would be in violation of Republicans’ demands that they would not vote on any bill until it’s been posted for 72 hours. The rules package is not technically a bill, but at 55 pages it should be studied before being approved.
Fox News senior congressional correspondent Chad Pergram notes, “Republicans were often apoplectic about Democrats passing big bills “in the dark of night,” et al.”
Despite all of that, as CQ Roll Call’s Lindsey McPherson reveals, only one of the countless concessions McCarthy made is actually included in the rules package.
NEW: Updated rules package posted but only change in here is on the motion to vacate, going back to original one member threshold for privilege.
Everything else holdouts got is not baked into the rules. Must be in writing somewhere else. https://t.co/kygJZS1k0a
— @lindsemcpherson (@lindsemcpherson) January 6, 2023
That’s the agreement that any single House Member could call for the Speaker, presumably McCarthy, to “vacate” – be removed, or thrown out. It would take a majority vote, but it could easily make managing his contentious caucus even more difficult.
Assuming the rules package will pass may be premature. According to veteran journalist Brian J. Karem, so-called “moderate” Republicans, angered by McCarthy giving away so much to the extremists in their party, may align with Democrats and vote down the critical resolution.
Karem reports, “a senior dem member has shared that moderate Rs have reached out suggesting that if McCarthy wins by making these Freedom Caucus concessions, some moderates will work with Dems to vote down that rules package.”
Talking Points Memo editor and publisher Josh Marshall warns the next two years will be dangerous.
“To become Speaker McCarthy has handed control of the House to the hard right authoritarian caucus that brought us the insurrection and was repudiated at the ballot box. It will be a dangerous two years.”
McCarthy, who has been in House Republican leadership for 14 years, including Minority Leader for three, told reporters Friday afternoon, “because it took this long” to convince holdouts to vote for him, “now we learned how to govern.”
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Maine Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Graham Platner is under fire after releasing a video declaring that new allegations against him are false, yet he is “taking time to reflect” on a path forward.
Politico on Monday afternoon reported that a woman who dated Platner, Jenny Racicot, “says he forced her to have sex with him nearly five years ago despite her repeated objections, an allegation Platner denies.”
“Racicot said she had an on-and-off relationship with Platner,” Politico reported, “for more than two years before he entered her rural Maine home uninvited one night in late 2021, deeply intoxicated, and forced himself on her while she repeatedly told him to stop. She said she cut off contact with him after telling him the encounter was not consensual.”
In a video posted to social media eleven minutes after the Politico story dropped, Platner says, “I wanted to directly address the troubling, serious, and false allegations against me. Any accusation of nonconsensual behavior is categorically false.”
He said he and his supporters “were united in a love of Maine, a belief that our politics must change, in a focus on defeating Susan Collins.”
“So, regardless of the inaccuracy of the reporting, but mindful the political reality will inflict, we are taking the time to reflect on the best path forward for the state that I love, the people that I love, the movement I belong to, and the goal of defeating Susan Collins.”
“Those were the goals when we launched this campaign. And they remain my goals today.”
“Throughout it all, you never turned your back on me. And I will not turn my back on you now. Every one of you deserves to see that vision come to fruition and see Susan Collins defeated. And we will use every tool at our disposal to do so.”
The Bulwark’s Tim Miller, a political commentator who served as the communications director for the Jeb Bush 2016 presidential campaign, blasted Platner.
“I’m sorry but ‘we are taking time to reflect on the best path forward’ is not an option on the table,” Miller wrote. “Either it’s false and you campaign with vigor or it’s true and you get out / apologize to everyone you let down.”
Journalist Ryan Grim, commenting on Platner’s video, noted that Platner “strongly suggests he is considering dropping out. Already Troy Jackson and Chellie Pingree, both gubernatorial candidates, are being kicked around in Maine circles as potential replacements.”
Several others, including Puck News’ Peter Hamby, predicted Platner will be dropping out.
Platner had postponed several campaign events before the Politico story was published.
— Graham Platner for Senate (@grahamformaine) July 6, 2026
President Donald Trump is facing backlash after posting a video of children — including showing their unblurred faces — graduating from kindergarten, with some of the girls purportedly wearing hijabs.
“President Trump posted a captionless video of graduating kindergarteners on Truth Social on Monday, goading his supporters into verbally attacking little children simply for being Muslim,” The New Republic reported. “The clip is from Gateway STEM Academy, a majority-Black K-8 public charter school in St. Paul, Minnesota. It shows about 21 children in caps and gowns on stage singing a song together. Most of the girls are wearing hijabs.”
The original post of the video which Trump reposted reads: “Public school in St. Paul, Minnesota. Every girl is in a hijab … in kindergarten.”
Trump did not add any comments. TNR called the post “Islamophobic, weird, and creepy,” while noting that the comments section of Trump’s post was filled with calls “by racist, xenophobic MAGA supporters” to “deport the children and ban hijabs.”
TNR also noted that it “should come as no surprise that Trump isn’t above attacking children who just learned how to read, but this post is still particularly discomforting—and will certainly contribute to the already potent level of anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. and in Minnesota.”
Critics blasted Trump.
“There is something deeply unsettling about the president of the United States—the most powerful person in the world—going after kindergarten schoolchildren in Minnesota because they wore hijabs, as Trump has done this morning on his website,” The Bulwark’s Sam Stein wrote.
One social media commentator wrote, “Trump posted an unblurred video of more than a dozen Muslim kindergartners to Truth Social, exposing the children’s faces while targeting them for their religion.”
Another added, “Trump is a bigot. The president took to Truth Social to attack kindergarteners in hijabs. These are little kids. The president isn’t just a bigot, he’s also a coward.”
The original video was posted to the X social media platform in June.
U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) at the time commented, “If you are in a public school in America, you should be speaking english.”
Image via Reuters
President Donald Trump’s apparent efforts to delay releasing the $5.8 million civil judgment to E. Jean Carroll are being met with a warning by the journalist’s legal team, who suggest there could be a legal maneuver for Trump to employ to forgo paying the judgment in either of the two cases he lost.
According to The Guardian, on July 4, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered Trump to release the $5.8 million judgment, which is in escrow, to Carroll by this coming Tuesday — or explain why he would not do so.
Carroll’s attorneys think Trump may be trying to buy time to mount another legal strategy, telling the judge that Trump’s request for an extension “appears to be little more than yet another play for time.”
“The case is separate from Trump’s appeal of a Manhattan civil jury’s 2024 award of $83.3m to Carroll for defamation,” The Guardian explains. “But her lawyers have suggested a legal scenario in which the president might seek to conjoin the cases and further delay payment of both.”
Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan (no relation to the judge) wrote, “We can only assume that defendant is seeking … to buy time so he can try to concoct some new basis to put off paying plaintiff presumably in connection with his forthcoming petition and motion for a rehearing.”
Trump’s former attorney, Justin Smith, in one of his final acts, wrote to the Supreme Court suggesting that his client would be appealing the $83.3 million civil judgment.
Smith argued that the Supreme Court “may wish to consider the petitions together,” given they involve the same parties.
The larger judgment case involves possible questions of presidential immunity, and that has Carroll’s attorneys concerned.
“A conjoined case, Carroll’s lawyers fear, could result in both judgments being wiped out,” The Guardian reports.
The president has also made clear he is no fan of Judge Kaplan, after the jurist made several rulings that “angered” Trump.
“What else can you expect from a Trump Hating, Clinton appointed judge, who went out of his way to make sure that the result was as negative as it could possible be,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in 2023, “speaking to, and in control of, a jury from an anti-Trump area which is probably the worst place in the US for me to get a fair ‘trial’.”
Image via Reuters
Platner Scorched Over ‘Taking Time’ Video After New Accusation
Trump Sparks Fury Online After Posting Unblurred Video of Muslim Kindergartners in Hijabs
One Legal Maneuver Threatens to Undo Everything E. Jean Carroll Won
Inside the Group Helping MAGA Voters Walk Away — And What Finally Pushed Them
