Former president Donald Trump was nominated for the position of Speaker of the House by Florida congressman Matt Gaetz in a stunning show of support for the MAGA movement during the 7th round of voting Thursday morning.
Gaetz had previously declared his intentions to nominate the former president during campaign rallies during the summer of 2022.
Watch as Gaetz boldly stands up during his roll call and offers the name many conservatives have long been waiting to hear:
VIDEO: Rep. @mattgaetz votes Donald Trump for Speaker pic.twitter.com/o1wjN2JTDs
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) January 5, 2023
“Donald John Trump,” Gaetz announces upon standing, quickly sitting to a silenced hall and a look of disbelief on colleague Marjorie Taylor Greene’s face.
Last July, Gaetz stated that he would nominate Donald Trump if the GOP reclaimed the House.
“After the next election cycle when we take back the House of Representatives, when we send [current Speaker] Nancy Pelosi back to the filth of San Francisco, my commitment to you is that my vote for Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives will go to Donald J. Trump,” the Florida congressman said during a rally in Sarasota.
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Matt Gaetz states that when the Republicans take back the House of Representatives, he commits to vote for Trump as Speaker of the House. pic.twitter.com/4kPiuVx6pP
— PatriotTakes 🇺🇸 (@patriottakes) July 3, 2021
Gaetz has been one of the few Republican holdouts against voting for Kevin McCarthy. Appearing on Fox News, he ravaged the California RINO’s chances of earning the requisite 218 votes, citing his time in Washington, D.C. as nothing more than a funnel for lobbyists and lacking any real political ideology.
“The reason we’ve demanded that is that we do not trust Kevin McCarthy. And it’s not a small body of work. The guy has been in leadership in Washington, DC for 14 years. And this town needs to change. And we’re going to change it one way or the other, either by changing out the Speaker or by having the most fundamental rewrite of the rules in really my lifetime,” Gaetz said.
“We’re not trying to dictate terms we represent our constituents,” he continued. “Look, part of the group think of Washington DC is you come here and you’ve just got to give the lobbyist your vote card and the leadership your calendar and everything will be okay. Kevin McCarthy has no ideology, even his own supporters would admit that in private. He is simply a vessel through which lobbyists and special interests operate.”
Newsweek noted at the time that there are no rules preventing a member of the public at large from serving in the role of House Speaker.
The Constitution—which states that “the House of Representatives shall chuse (sic) their Speaker and other Officers”—does not expressly state that the House Speaker must be a member of the chamber. However, many legal experts who have examined the issue believe that the founders intended for the Speaker to be chosen from a pool of elected representatives.