A Congressional game of Clue began on Tuesday afternoon. On a baby-changing station in a bathroom under the House floor, an unknown culprit left a draft resolution put forward by Republican Matt Gaetz to declare the position of Speaker of the House as vacant — removing the troubled Kevin McCarthy as the leader of the body’s divided Republican caucus.
The discarded draft, first reported by independent journalist Matt Laslo, looks to be from September 15 — three days after Gaetz threatened to vote to remove McCarthy. (Gaetz and others in the far-right wing of the GOP wanted to vote on individual appropriations bills ahead of the September 30 deadline, rather than pass them all as one big piece of legislation, as is standard.) Because McCarthy probably has enough votes to survive any coup attempt, Gaetz’s threat is probably empty. But the method of the leak here is worth noting — either a brilliant or extremely dumb way to pass off information in Congress.
