Kevin McCarthy’s Speech After Losing Historic Vote Transcript

Good evening, all. President Abraham Lincoln once said, “I’m an optimist because I don’t see any other way.” If you ever come to my office, you’ll see the portraits of Lincoln and Reagan, and I firmly believe if Reagan gave us advice, he would say, “If you believe your principles bring people greater freedom, you should be happy about it.” I’ve always been excited that I’ve been a happy conservative, but I’ve always believed that I’ve been so fortunate to be an American. My journey to this office was something people wouldn’t understand. I grew up in a town of Bakersfield, California, the son of a firefighter, the grandson of immigrants. Parents worked hard, the youngest in my family, didn’t have great wealth and got out of high school, I didn’t have great grades, couldn’t get a scholarship. Went to community college. Flipped cars to try to pay my way through it. Went to visit some buddies away in college for a weekend, stopped at the grocery store to cash a check, and I won the lottery. One of the first in California. It was before Biden economics, it was only 5,000, but it went much further back then.

(01:19)
Took my folks to dinner, put the majority of the rest of the money into the stock market, and did pretty well. The next semester I took a break from school. I went to buy a franchise, but no one said they would sell me one, because I was only 20 years old. But I learned then never to give up, so I opened my own business selling sandwiches. Three things I learned. First to work, last to leave, last to be paid. I wanted to finish my college degree. At that time, no one in my family had finished a four year degree. I did pretty well. I now had enough money that I could pay my way through school as long as I went to Cal State. So I sold my business, going to school. I opened up the local paper and said, “Be a summer intern in Washington, DC,” with my local congressman. I did not know this man, but I thought he’d be lucky to have me, so I applied.

(02:08)
You know what he did? He turned me down. But you want to know the end of the story? I got elected to the seat I couldn’t get an internship for. I ended up being the 55th Speaker of the House. One of the greatest honors. I loved every minute. And the one thing I will tell you is doing the right thing isn’t always easy, but it is necessary. I don’t regret standing up for choosing governance over grievance. It is my responsibility. It is my job. I do not regret negotiating. Our government is designed to find compromise. I don’t regret my efforts to build coalitions and find solutions. I was raised to solve problems, not create them. So I may have lost a vote today, but as I walk out of this chamber, I feel fortunate to have served the American people. I leave the Speakership with a sense of pride, accomplishment, and yes, optimism.

(03:11)
From the day I entered politics my mission has always been to make tomorrow better than today. I fought for what I believe in and I believe in this country of America. My goals have not changed. My ability to fight is just in a different form. You need 218. Unfortunately, 4% of our conference can join all the Democrats and dictate who could be the Republican Speaker in this house. I don’t think that rule is good for the institution, but apparently I’m the only one. I believe I can continue to fight, maybe in a different manner. I will not run for Speaker again. I will have the conference pick somebody else. I hope you realize that every day I did the job regardless whether you underestimated me or not, I wanted to do it with a smile.

(04:07)
I grew to enjoy you even on your toughest days in your questions. I could always tell what day it was based upon your question. Monday you would ask if I could pass the bill. Tuesday was whether the rule would pass. Wednesday was the greatest challenge ever to my Speakership. And Thursday when we passed the bill, you didn’t think it was a very big deal. And it all started again on Friday. I wouldn’t change a thing. I do believe I got a new portrait in there too, of Teddy Roosevelt. You all know the man in the arena, one of my favorite parts of it, “Who errs, who comes up short again and again, but there is no effort without error and shortcoming. Who spends himself in a worthy cause, who knows the triumph of high achievement, and if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly.”

(05:08)
I always like to take a risk. Saturday I took a risk for the American public. Regardless what anybody says, no one knew whether that would pass. The Democrats didn’t want that bill. Yes, they pulled a fire alarm, yes, they do their conga line, yes, they wanted to delay, but it was all for the American people. I could not look the troops in the eye and say I would not pay them. For those who spoke on the floor, I thank them for their positive talks. I don’t know what those who voted against and said there was some deal. They were never a part of any deal. For those who said about what we accomplished, I’m proud of what we accomplished from the parents’ bill of rights to our energy bill. But if they want to hold me liable because the Senate didn’t take it up or the President didn’t take it up, that’s politics for what I know.

(06:13)
But the one thing I do know, this country is too great for small visions of those eight. To any child that are listening and who are coming to visit the Capitol. This is a place I want you to visit. I liked opening the Capitol back up again. I liked taking away the metal detectors. I liked committees being able to work. I like people being able to visit. I hope you like being able to be back in. I think it was important that members actually show up to work as well. To paraphrase Lou Gehrig, he said, “I might’ve been given a bad break, but I truly still consider myself to be the luckiest man on the face of the Earth.” There’s no other country that you could rise to be the 55th Speaker, not get an internship, and be able to fight for the American public. So it was my greatest honor to be able to do it.

(07:11)
I love my conference. Well, I loved the ability…. I’ve been a part of the leadership team for quite some time. We won two majorities. As leader, I’m proud of the fact we only gained races, only gained seats. I’m proud of the fact as the Republican leader, we elected more women, we elected more minorities, we expanded the base. I’m proud of the fact that for the five years I leadered, two election cycles, we gained five more seats in California, five more in New York. We won in places no one thought we could win. The same thing, you would underestimate me, you always said we’d lose each time around. We kept gaining. I intend to make sure that we gain and keep the majority in the next cycle as well. With that, I look forward to your positive questions.

Will you remain in Congress?

I’ll look at that.

You still obviously made a lot of loyalty within the conference. We’ve heard you say approximately 10,000 times that you never give up. So I’m wondering why did you make the decision not to put your name forward again and try to grind it out like you did when you won the job in the first place?

You need 218 for the rule, 218 to move forward. And I’ll never give up on the American people. That doesn’t mean I have to be Speaker to do what I have to do for the American people. There’s a lot of things I could do for the American people. But you know what’s interesting, everybody’s sitting there… In today’s world, if you’re sitting in Congress and you took a gamble to make sure government was still open and eight people can throw you out as Speaker, and the Democrats who said they wanted to keep government open, I think you got a real divide. I think you got a real institutional problem. Interesting,

It was in this room after we had won the majority I had became speaker less. And Nancy Pelosi came to me, she was speaker at the time, on the way out, and I told her I was having issues with getting enough votes. And she said, “What’s the problem?” I said, “They want this one person can rule you out.” She was the only speaker to have changed that rule. I had the power to call the vote on her, but I never would. I lost some votes because of it. And she said, “Just give it to them. I’ll always back you up.” I made the same offer to Boehner and same thing to Paul, because I believe in the institution. I think today was a political decision by the Democrats. And I think the things they have done in the past hurt the institution. When they just started removing people from committee and they just started doing the other things. And my fear is the institution fell today. Because you can’t do the job if eight people, you have 94% or 96% of your entire conference, but eight people can partner with the whole other side. How do you govern? And for them to make a motion on me because I made a decision for the country, that they agreed with, but they choose to do the other. That becomes a problem.

(10:21)
Yes, sir.

One, are you planning on endorsing a successor to you and then-

I might. I might.

You might. Who would that be?

I don’t know who’s running yet. I’ll talk to people.

Okay. And when you look back, is there anything you could have done differently with those eight members?

Yeah, a lot of them I helped get elected, so I probably should have picked somebody else.

What if the 200 don’t give a [inaudible 00:10:49] view, I think of Banks here, there’s others that really, really support you. [inaudible 00:10:54] nominated again, you keep getting nominated. [inaudible 00:10:59]

I love these 200, they’ve gone through so much, they’re down in the conference. They’ll say they’re going to keep voting for me. I think you should put the country first. This job was never about me. I hope you felt that, that I always felt what can we do best to move forward?

(11:24)
I mean, I treated Hakeem the way I wanted to be treated. I’d tell him things we were doing throughout, so he never was questioned. I wanted to bring the body back differently. We created a select committee on China. I changed the intel committee. They just came back from MIT where they all had a bipartisan briefing on AI and quantum. Started doing briefings with AI, the whole conference, of Republicans and Democrats alike. We’re far from solving that problem, but I’m proud of what we were able to do there. So we’ll continue.

(11:58)
Yes, sir.

When did you make this decision? Did you know if the motion eventually succeeded that you would not run again or was this right afterwards [inaudible 00:12:08]

Not all those eight, but these are the same people that never voted for me. They thought it was big, they went to present after we went through 15 rounds. Why do I do something for myself that can hurt the country? Why create … I’m not quite sure those individuals are looking to be productive. It concerns me as a Republican based upon watching what they do. I want to be a Republican and a conservative that governs. And we’re going to have to find our way to do that.

(12:46)
The challenge is we had so many opportunities, these are the same people that sat on the floor and criticized me that we didn’t get all 12 spending bills done. But we first had to do a debt ceiling that they didn’t support. They held up every appropriation bill in the summer because they wouldn’t let it come through. After the debt ceiling, they stopped us from doing anything on the floor. When we had a continuing resolution that would do something on the border, I listened to one talk about how it made him think about the border when he voted against it. And then they wanted to challenge me because I worked with the other side so America could go forward and government could stay open. If you have to lose for something, I will always lose for the country. It is a much better battle to have.

(13:36)
Yes, sir.

Doing this job, what advice do you have for the next speaker? What would you like to see the next speaker [inaudible 00:13:42].

Change the rules.

Do you regret allowing that rule to be in place?

Do you think I let it? I mean, for the whole point, I mean, if you talk about a Gaetz, Gaetz came to the whole conference and said, “We will never use this. We’ll never use this.” I mean, this is a man that sat there on the 14th vote and said, “Okay, I’m going to vote for you next time it falls back,” and not. So, I mean, it’s just the trustworthiness of a lot of individuals, it makes it difficult.

(14:11)
But I do not think, regardless of who the speaker is, that you should have that rule. Everybody had it but Pelosi. But it was never used until it started getting used against Boehner. And if you can always count on the other party to vote in a block against it, then you’re allowing four to five people to control whatever. So it doesn’t matter, even if you have 96%. So that is not a government that works, that is chaotic.

(14:47)
Yeah?

Mr. McCarthy, is the Republican Party [inaudible 00:14:58].

Okay. Go right ahead.

I hear you talking about the challenge to Republicans, I wonder what you think this means, what it says about the Republican Party?

I don’t think it says about the Republican Party, I think it says something about some people who are not a conservative. I mean, if you were a conservative and you only had one entity making the battle and you vote against securing the border, you vote against cutting the wasteful spending and then you partner with all the Democrats. Now you’ll phrase it all the other different ways. That’s not a conservative.

(15:22)
Look, you all know Matt Gaetz. You know it was personal. It had nothing to do about spending. It had nothing to do about … Everything he accused somebody of he was doing. It all was about getting attention from you. I mean, we’re getting email fundraisers from him as he’s doing it. “Join in quickly.” That’s not governing, that’s not becoming of a member of Congress. And regardless of what you think, I’ve seen the texts, it was all about his ethics. But that’s all right.

Just a question, can I just clarify really quickly from the first question. Are you considering resigning?

No, I said … He asked about that. I haven’t thought about that.

You haven’t thought about it.

Yeah.

And then just, where are you placing the blame? You said the institution is-

Look, look, look. No, no, no. I’m not going to blame anybody. There’s not blame anywhere. Look, I give it as good as I get it. So you know the challenge, I knew going in. You would take a poll all the time, is he going to get thrown out this week? But you know what, if I lose my job over doing what I truly believe what’s right, I’m very at peace with it.

(16:36)
You asked earlier, when did I decide? I knew they would make the motion on me. It didn’t make one bit of difference, I felt very comfortable in that decision. And I think the American public believe that decision was right.

Do you think Matt Gaetz should be expelled from the Republican conference?

That’s the conference’s decision.

Mr. McCarthy, now, you mentioned that you were looking to maybe help skill in another way. Would you consider having a position somewhere in the conference, whether it’s leadership or maybe the chairman. Can you talk about [inaudible 00:17:08].

No, no, no, no, no. There’s a lot of great people in conference. There’s always other people to do jobs. It is amazing the talent that we have. And the one thing I’ve always hoped as Speaker that we lifted more of that talent up. I look at people doing a lot of different jobs and the different opportunities we did, and they’re doing an exceptional job. We have so much talent, it is remarkable.

(17:32)
Yes.

Thank you. Is this in your mind a little bit pre-ordained from the beginning, obviously it was a much more narrow majority than what you anticipated, what Republicans considered, 15 rounds, the longest Speaker’s race since 1859.

I made history, didn’t I?

Well, you did do that, yeah. But was that always thought that it was inevitably going to go this way because of the narrow majority and because the writing might’ve been on the wall because of that [inaudible 00:18:00]

Would any of

Any of you think if it took that long and you had one person, you knew it was always a possibility, so that was fine. It didn’t bother me. It didn’t change any of my decision I made, but it was interesting. I read a tweet the other day of Matt Rosendale. He goes to mass every day, but you know what he said his prayer was all last year ?that Republicans didn’t have a big victory, that they had a narrow victory. When you have members like that that are part of your team, you got a tough team.

(18:32)
Look, when I was in business, I got to hire and fire who worked with me. Somebody else hires them, somebody else fires them. My job was to inspire them. I think we did some good work and I think we’ll continue to do great work. Yes, sir.

Can you reflect back on 2010 when you guys were the young guns? You, Paul Ryan-

Eric Cantor. Yeah.

Now all three of you guys have been essentially-

Well, we’re not that young anymore.

Well, all three have been pushed out by so-called more conservative members.

No, let’s be fair, and it’s wrong that you ever say. They are not conservatives. They voted against, one, the greatest cut in history that Congress has ever voted for. Two trillion. They voted against work requirements. They voted against NEPA reform. They voted against border security. They don’t get to say they’re conservative because they’re angry and they’re chaotic. That’s not the party I belong to. The party of Reagan was if you believed in your principles, that you could govern in a conservative way. They are not conservatives and they do not have the right to have the title. Yes.

Are you worried that Donald Trump turned your party in this direction that makes it difficult to govern, makes it difficult to get conservative [inaudible 00:19:52]?

Why do you say that? Because your question doesn’t hold true to history. When Donald Trump was president, we did tax reform. You can look at all of our different successes. You may dislike the policy, but we’ve been very successful. You watched the Abraham Accords. You can go victory after victory. The price of gas. We were energy independent at the time. We had more businesses growing at the time. We didn’t have to evacuate our embassies. It’s easy on its merit to see the difference of what Biden has destroyed America, to what the policies we were able to create. Yes, sir.

Can I ask you what about your conversation with Hakeem Jefferies? What did he ask from you? What were you asking for?

No, we didn’t ask for anything.

You didn’t ask for anything at all? You didn’t ask him [inaudible 00:20:44] the impeachment inquiry or anything like that?

No, no, no. And I have a lot of respect for Hakeem. He wants to win the majority. I heard what they said in conference. Why would they vote for me if I’ve won every time as leader? I raised 70% of all the money. It’s an opportunity for them. The real question to the eight, why would you enable and allow the Democrats to do it? That’s the question. Yes.

Do you regret making concessions to those holdouts?

What concessions did I make?

Well, you could have leaned towards Democrats to give them the possibility-

To what?

To secure [inaudible 00:21:35] Speakership-

Look, I’m not going to… No. I’m a Republican. I win by Republicans and I lose by Republicans. It’s not that way. I believe you should work across the aisle. I worked across the aisle at times. Do I want to make the bill the most conservative possible? Yes. That’s the goal. It’s difficult when you can’t get 218 for the conservative bill and then they want to challenge you when you went and solved and kept the government open. Yes, sir.

The last few months you’ve been a firewall against the debt ceiling crisis, government shutting down.

We did pretty well, didn’t we?

How big of a risk do you think a shutdown is in November without you as Speaker?

Other people can do the job. You know what’s interesting? I’ve never received so many texts from so many senators about how big a play we just did the other day or how many congratulations about the debt ceiling and the other. If I would go back to the days before the debt ceiling, none of you even thought I’d get a meeting with the President. All of you’d asked me, is it going to fall off the cliff? At the end of the day, we worked an agreement out. Some of those people got mad about it, but two thirds, the highest number of Republicans ever voted for a debt ceiling when you had it. And you only negotiate it based upon the deal we win. That was the moment they wanted to go after, and that’s what they continued to follow through.

You mentioned that you don’t mind negotiating. You see it as part of the job.

You should. Look, government’s designed that you have to have compromise. No, you can’t get everything that you want. You’ve got a House, you’ve got a Senate. But you had more of the question.

Well, that’s my point. The question was just going to be some of the criticism leveled you today by both Democrats and by Republicans is that perhaps you’ve been too transactional.

In which way?

Partly about keeping your word.

And which word did I not keep? Name one thing I did not keep.

Gaetz says that there’s several things you didn’t keep from January-

Oh, no, no, no. Tell me, what did Gaetz say? What did I not keep in Gaetz’s mind? Because Gaetz had never been a part of a discussion. Just because Gaetz said something, don’t believe it’s true. I haven’t heard him say one true thing yet.

Democrats say you reneged-

On what?

… on the debt ceiling bill.

On what?

On the debt ceiling.

That is not true. So no, no, no. If you’re going to ask the question, you’re going to say it, tell me how I did something different on the debt ceiling bill. Any of you, tell me what I did different on the debt ceiling that I didn’t keep my word.

You said it was a floor. You said it was a ceiling.

Is it not a ceiling? Okay. This is the-

[inaudible 00:24:11].

Okay. No, no, no, no, no, no. When you agree to spending levels, that’s the maximum amount you can spend. This is what is wrong with Washington. Because it’s the height that you can spend, you can also spend less. We’re a different body. So does any of you believe then the Senate broke their word on the debt ceiling because they spent more than the limit, but somehow I’m wrong because I want to save the taxpayers more money? We’re our own body. I have two children. If I give them each $100 for dinner and one spends 100 and spends 80, am I going to yell at the one who spent 80 and said, “Oh my God, you got to spend it all?” It’s not our money. And why am I getting criticized? Because I’m fighting for the American people that we can eliminate waste. And you know what? We’re our own body. So if we can pass the bills and the Senate can pass the bills, but they pass them higher, but they haven’t passed anything, somehow I’m wrong? I kept my word. I did not spend over the limit. They broke their word.

You don’t feel you’re too transactional?

Okay. You used the word. How was I transactional? If you ask a question, I want you to show an example. Give me an example.

Well, the definition is basically this for that.

So what did I do this for that?

Well, on the CR, you had been talking about leaving it in, leaving it out, and then finally you put it out.

No, no. You’re making no sense. What transactional did it? No, no. I did no transactional. I tried to pass a conservative stop-gap measure that secured the border and actually cut spending. When that didn’t go, the only bill that was going was sitting over in the Senate that had a stopgap measure, disaster, and Ukraine. I made a decision as Speaker to keep the government open and I put something on the floor. And let me get this straight to all of you, because someone said I did… 72-hour rule. I’m the only one who’s lived by it. We’re the ones who created it. We never broke the 72-hour rule. The bill I put on the floor was a suspension, which takes a two-thirds vote. And you know what? You can put a suspension on a rule and you can waive it based upon the leadership. That’s exactly what I followed.

(26:28)
So my question to you is, when somebody says something, don’t take it that it’s gospel. Why don’t you ask them to point. When Gaetz said I didn’t follow [inaudible 00:26:38], show me one place. You saw Massey, Thomas Massey, who is the hardest line person say, “We followed all the rules all the time.” That he was in the room when the agreement was made, and then we surpassed what we said we would do. So if you ask me a question, I’m

I’m going to answer back because when it’s not true, it’s not fair.

How important is it that the Speaker of the House be a member of the institution? Some members are floating [inaudible 00:27:08].

They always float, some of them.

Is that important [inaudible 00:27:12]?

Yes. Okay. First of all, you’ve got to be in the institution to understand how it works. And look, it’s legal to have somebody else. I just do not think that would ever be good.

[Inaudible 00:27:25].

Do I regret?

I’m sorry.

You start with this question. I don’t think you’ve ever been positive on one yet, but come on. I have high hope. This is going to be exciting.

You’re rubbing off on me.

That’s a good thing.

I actually don’t think you’re out yet, but do you regret not reaching out personally to people like Nancy Mays, Tim Burchett, who sat down on the House steps today and told reporters that you said something condescending to him.

Okay, let’s get this. I personally like Tim Burchett, and I called Tim Burchett because I read his quote. And Tim Burchett’s a friend of mine, which I’m kind of shocked by this. And Tim Burchett, in his quote said, “He’s leaning towards, no, he’s on CNN, but I’m going to pray about it.” So I pick up the phone and call him. Because I didn’t think he was already there. I said, “Tim, I read your quote. You said you’re going to pray about it. I wanted to talk to you about it.” And somehow he construes that I’m a Christian, I’m not going to offend somebody from it. I simply read his quote back. I thought there was still an opening and I wanted to talk to him about it. He never mentioned anything when we were communicating like that, and he said it. Nancy Mace is a whole nother story. Okay? Let’s just be honest here.

(28:34)
This is the one that… And I just got a text from her primary opponent saying, “Why’d you spend 3 million?” But I called Nancy Mace’s chief of staff yesterday. And-

She didn’t like that.

Because I called the chief of staff?

Yeah. She wanted you to call her personally.

Well, she was on the view saying I didn’t keep my word, so I didn’t know what to… Listen, I can’t say this in the press, but okay. No, you’ll keep it among yourselves, right?

This is like [inaudible 00:29:08].

Wait till my book. No, so I call her chief of staff because, I don’t know, maybe I don’t connect her with something else, but I just said to him, I said, “Can you please tell me, I don’t understand, where have I not kept my word?” You know what her chief of staff said? “You have kept your word, a hundred percent.” Members come to me, and one thing, I don’t like the idea that a member comes and tries to leverage me. I don’t go for that. I’ll vote for the bill you do, that’s not well. But if you have a problem with the bill, I want to help you. But I can’t sit there and write your entire bill and work it all the way through committee. We just got her one bill out, then came back, the other bill doing on guns that just wasn’t working. Do you want to do something else? We did something else. I just don’t appreciate…

(29:55)
Look, I bite my lip. I let people say things that are not true, but it’s not right. It is not right. Her chief of staff told all of us, we have kept every single one of our words. And he said he’s told her that too. Now if somehow he gets fired, I’ll still get him a job.

Last question.

Wait, I’m being too honest now?

Your argument about the health of the institution might have resonated with more Democrats, if not for your response to January 6th. Do you regret and [inaudible 00:30:25]-

Oh my God.

… comments about January 6th?

No, but do I regret the Democrats playing games with January 6th? Yes. They played so many politics. What they did to this institution and what they did to this building was so wrong. The idea that they put magnetometers there, the idea that they would go to any Republican member that they had been co-sponsors or bills, and they no longer could be a co-sponsor, that they would fine members $5,000 if the magnetometers went on. But when Nancy went around it or Clyburn was supposed to get a fine, it all got waived. The idea that bills didn’t have to go through committee. The idea they created a select committee on January 6th and they wouldn’t let the minority appoint who to do it. Look, I’m trying to change all that, and bring the body back to they can work together, but I think they did a lot of damage to us. Yes, sir?

The House is trying to pass the corporations bill one by one. What are your expectations for that process now that you’re not [inaudible 00:31:21]-

Well, that’s always been my goal. I had just talked to Mitch yesterday, and I had to call in to Schumer, and I talked to Hakeem last night, what I was going to do is… because we had taken five up, we passed four of them. I was going to start individually pre-conferencing, so we can get this work done. I’m concerned with the timeline now. Look, I truly believe at the end of the day we can get this all worked out. I do believe at the end of the day, we could find common ground and do something about the border. I don’t know if this has caused problems. Look, I was doing Squawk today and they had the other TV on MSNBC. The first time I saw MSNBC running a whole story about the border, with people just walking across. Pritzker sent a letter yesterday about the immigration. Massachusetts governor, state of emergency. Connecticut. Everybody’s becoming the number one… They cannot ignore it.

(32:20)
And I had told my members all before, I heard Gates say something on the floor that, “Oh my God, Kevin asked for a stop gap measure when he came back.” The whole plan was, because those eight and a few more had held up passing any of these probes bills all summer, I was going to do just what we did Saturday, a stop gap measure with disaster. I’d gone out to Hawaii, we looked what happened in Florida. Those people shouldn’t be held back. And we could finish doing it all individually, but somehow they think that’s a dirty-