....McCarthy needed a majority of all members voting to win, which can fluctuate depending on who shows up. Of 432 votes cast in the penultimate round, McCarthy had 216.
....McCarthy either needed another member to vote present or for someone to flip to an affirmative vote.
....The concessions McCarthy offered during the course of negotiations included making it easier to oust the speaker, an agreement to institute a 72-hour window for members to read bills before they get a vote, and a pledge to vote on legislation to institute term limits for members of Congress.
....The high-stakes impasse is historic: It is the first time in a century that an election of a House speaker took multiple ballots to complete. The longest vote in U.S. history took place in 1855, lasting 133 rounds over two months.
The drama of not electing a speaker has very real consequences. The House could not conduct any business, including swearing in new members, until a speaker was chosen.
....The impasse likely foreshadows the chaos expected during the next two years of divided government on Capitol Hill, where Republicans hold a very narrow majority and the conservative Freedom Caucus has shown its willingness to hold the rest of the Republican conference hostage to its demands.
....Many of the House Republicans who spurred on gridlock of the speaker elections this week were supportive of Trump's effort to challenge the results of the 2020 presidential election.
...."If we are forced to be here this evening because of the chaos and crisis on the other side, it's only fair to point out, Madam Clerk, that the same individuals who fanned the flames of Jan. 6, who told their followers and their followers' followers that they needed to fight back, and who challenged the swearing in of members based on a bogus claim of fake electors may well be in charge of the People's House, if they can ever agree on who can lead them," Aguilar said.
What it boils down to for these members is three things:
wanting to see less government spending,
more power to them and less power for the speaker, and
mistrust and personality differences"
....He earned the support of every Democrat in the House, including Toni Rose of Dallas, who praised Phelan for supporting her bill in 2021 to expand Medicaid coverage for new mothers.
....In his nominating speech for Tinderholt, Slaton said the tradition in the House of selecting some minority party members — in Texas, Democrats — for committee chair positions is an overly generous "consolation prize" for losing an election. He said Phelan’s adherence to that tradition means Republicans can pass only some conservative legislative priorities each session while ignoring others.
....Critics attacked him for appointing Democrats to leadership positions in the chamber, following a long-held chamber tradition to appoint members of the minority party as committee chairs. Phelan has not budged on the issue, indicating he once again plans to allow some Democratic chairs and arguing that the Texas House operates better on a bipartisan basis and eschewing the divisiveness seen in Washington, D.C."
[NOTE: 150 members in the Texas House.]
....Phelan, however, said in September that if he’s reelected House speaker, he would appoint the same proportion of Democratic committee chairs for the next session. Phelan appointed 13 Democratic committee chairs at the start of the last session, out of 34 standing committees."
"The Texas House tradition of having committee chairs from both parties goes back decades and has been a constant under both Democratic and Republican speakers," said Rep. Chris Turner of Grand Prairie, leader of the House Democratic Caucus and chairman of the House Business and Industry Committee. "Texas is well-served by this practice."