Biden to mark Jan. 6 anniversary by warning the Big Lie remains

President Joe Biden on Friday will mark the two-year anniversary of a violent mob storming the U.S. Capitol with a solemn tribute of the day.

He’ll also deliver a warning: the threats that were exposed by the Jan. 6 select committee, and appeared beat back in the 2022 midterms, remain very much at large.

According to multiple advisers, Biden will use Friday’s address to again put center stage the danger and chaos posed by election deniers even as the November elections in which many of them lost their races for office begin to fade from view. He will link Republicans to the extremists who attempted to forcibly overturn the results of Donald Trump’s defeat.

“Our democracy still stands on a knife’s edge: the forces that brought us to the brink on January 6th continue to work to undermine the basic pillars of our Republic [and] the radicalism of the Republican Party has not disappeared,” said Eddie Glaude, a professor at Princeton University who has met with Biden on the topic.

“President Biden has to keep sounding the alarm,” Glaude said. “What ails us cannot be remedied with one election or with the decline of Donald Trump.”

There was never any debate within the White House about whether to prominently commemorate the anniversary of the insurrection. This year the date falls at a moment of political opportunity for Biden, who will address the nation at the same time the Republican-led House of Representatives has descended into chaos in choosing its next speaker and Donald Trump, the GOP’s only declared presidential candidate, continues to espouse widely-rejected election denialism.

A year ago, Biden made the trip to the Capitol and delivered a forceful condemnation of Trump and his allies for holding “a dagger at the throat of America” by promoting lies about the election that spurred the violence in the very hall where he stood.

That speech began a year-long thread which Biden used to connect the events of Jan. 6 with the fringe elements of the GOP as well as the election deniers who sought posts in Congress and statehouses across the country. The House Jan. 6 committee toiled throughout the year to shed light on the factors that led to the insurrection in 2021, and the midterms ended with many of the most high-profile election deniers going down in defeat.

But internal polls show the issue resonated with voters — and the White House and Democrats have no plans to let go of it as they approach the runway of 2024.

White House aides have stressed that the central focus of Friday’s speech will be to primarily commemorate the tragedy and heroism of that day. Officials said Biden would salute members of law enforcement, including Capitol Police officers who held off rioters andelection officials who stood their ground in the face of Trump’s onslaught of lies.

“An important focus of his remarks will be on recognizing Americans who showed courage and patriotism, who put themselves in danger on behalf of others and on behalf of our democracy,” said White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre aboard Air Force One this week. “Jan. 6 was… one of the darkest days and sometimes [that] can lead to light and hope.”

Homegrown threats against the nation’s democracy have been a familiar theme for Biden, who launched his presidential campaign because he felt Trump was tearing at the nation’s fabric; and who returned to it repeatedly in his first months of his term.

When Biden met last summer with a group of prominent historians to discuss threats to American democracy, many emphasized the importance of him publicly calling out anti-democratic behavior, according to three people familiar with the discussions who asked for anonymity to discuss private conversations.

The historians warned Biden that ignoring it would be dangerous and could allow violent rhetoric and election denialism to become considered normal aspects of the country's politics. And they urged him to act, warning that how he responded to the challenges would inexorably become part of his legacy.

Biden took the warnings to heart. As the general election campaign ramped up last fall, he delivered a pair of speeches urging vigilance against violent anti-democratic forces, one set against the backdrop of Independence Hall and the other, just days before the midterms, coming after the brutal assault of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband.

It was not a universally cheered decision. Some party members expressed concern that the president was emphasizing concerns immaterial to most voters, who were consumed by inflation and loss of abortion rights.

But senior Biden advisors saw private polling after the midterms that showed that, even if the Jan. 6 committee’s work didn’t move the needle much with voters, warnings about prominent election deniers – including several candidates for governor and state secretaries of state – did have a significant impact, according to two people familiar with the findings but not authorized to discuss internal documents.

Though the midterms have passed and the committee has all but closed up shop, Biden will continue to sound the alarms in the months ahead, believing the threat has not dissipated.

The president’s speech on Friday comes as the House of Representatives has devolved into chaos, with a right-wing faction of the GOP that has paralyzed the process to select a speaker. Many of those same lawmakers – as well as others expected to play prominent roles in the new Congress – voted against Biden’s certification and have pushed false claims of election fraud.

“This speaker's fight is about the same thing Jan. 6 was about,” said Pete Giangreco, a veteran Democratic consultant in Chicago. “It isn't ideological. This is a group of people who don't believe in American democracy, institutions or the idea of majority rule.”

West Wing aides also point to Trump’s shadow looming over the political landscape. Though the former president has been politically weakened in recent months, many close to Biden believe Trump will still emerge as the GOP presidential nominee next year. As Biden takes steps to likely launch his own campaign in the coming months, some in his orbit are preparing to make Jan. 6 a central issue in the campaign.

A new Politico/Morning Consult poll out Thursday reveals that 45 percent of voters believe Trump is “very” responsible for the events of Jan. 6, 2021. More than 75 percent of Democrats say insurrection could impact their 2024 vote while 53 percent of independents and 35 percent of Republicans say the same.

“The evidence that the [Jan. 6] committee revealed has made even more clear that what happened almost two years ago was an attempted coup,” said Brendan Nyhan, democracy expert at Dartmouth College. “Threats still remain, though — most notably, from former President Trump, whom our experts identify as a serious or extraordinary threat to democracy if he is again nominated by the Republican Party.”

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Biden aides struggle to respond to Taliban’s latest curbs on women

The Biden administration is grappling with how to respond to new Taliban restrictions on women’s rights in Afghanistan, knowing that punishing the ruling Islamists risks rupturing the limited relationship the United States has with them.

The discussion among administration officials is fluid and positions have varied depending on the proposed penalties, a current administration official and a former U.S. official familiar with the talks said. Those proposals include new economic sanctions and tighter bans on Taliban leaders’ travels abroad, as well as limiting certain types of humanitarian aid to Afghanistan.

But in broad terms, according to the current and former officials, the debate has pitted Tom West, the U.S. special representative for Afghanistan, against Rina Amiri, the U.S. special envoy for Afghan women, girls and human rights. West is wary of going too far in isolating the Taliban, with whom the U.S. tries to cooperate on counter-terrorism, while Amiri wants to get tougher on them as they try to erase women from public life.

While insisting that the Taliban will face consequences, a State Department spokesperson on Thursday downplayed claims of differences between West and Amiri. In the latest deliberations, “Tom and Rina have been of a similar mind” and “in the same camp advocating for similar accountability mechanisms.” The spokesperson, however, would not describe the mechanisms being discussed or how far each official wanted to go.

Nearly 18 months after the U.S. military left and the Taliban took charge, Afghanistan’s deepening misery is a growing blight on President Joe Biden’s human rights record. It’s a topic that Republicans, who are taking control of the House, are likely to hammer as they launch investigations into the administration’s handling of Afghanistan.

But while Biden has long said that human rights are central to his foreign policy, he has defended his decision to pull U.S. troops from Afghanistan after a 20-year war effort. In the past, Biden has said the U.S. doesn’t bear responsibility for the fate of Afghan women and girls. He has largely avoided talking about the country in recent months, fueling a sense of helplessness among administration staffers grappling with how to respond to the growing crisis.

“We knew this was coming but dreaded it and couldn’t stop it,” said the current official, who, like the State Department spokesperson and others, requested anonymity to describe sensitive internal administration conversations.

The White House said it would offer comment on Biden’s position, but had not provided one as of publication time.

The Taliban leadership’s latest edicts, issued last month, bar women from universities and from working for many NGOs — leading several humanitarian groups to suspend operations in Afghanistan, where millions face starvation and other insecurity.

Months ago, the militant group’s top leaders barred girls from secondary schools, and they also have issued other decrees that ban women and girls from certain public spaces and jobs. There are fears they will ultimately bar girls from primary school.

The current administration official said there are interagency meetings scheduled this week to discuss a U.S. response, but a decision may not come until next week.

“We are working with our partners throughout the government and also with like-minded partners around the world to devise an appropriate set of consequences that register our condemnation for this outrageous edict on the part of the Taliban, while also protecting our status as the world’s leading humanitarian provider for the people of Afghanistan,” the State Department’s lead spokesperson, Ned Price, told reporters during Wednesday’s press briefing.

Washington has some leverage over the Taliban, both diplomatically and economically. The Taliban have sought international recognition as a government, and they also want foreign investment. The United States has sway over billions of dollars in Afghan funds that could help stabilize the country’s economy, and American sanctions have ripple effects that deter foreign investment.

But the Taliban have leverage, too, including the freedom they give to terrorist groups that operate from Afghan soil. Former Al Qaeda chief and 9/11 attacks plotter Osama bin Laden used Afghanistan as a base. Last year, his successor, Ayman al-Zawahiri, was killed by a U.S. drone strike in Kabul. The Islamic State terrorist group, meanwhile, is a Taliban rival and U.S. foe that has staged a number of attacks in Afghanistan over the past year and a half.

Cooperation on counterterrorism is just one of many factors that U.S. officials including West and Amiri — neither of whom responded to requests for comment — have to consider as they weigh how to respond to the Taliban’s human rights abuses.

The differences between West and Amiri are not massive and are more a matter of degree — both want to hold the Taliban accountable. Their stances also reflect their specific jobs, the current administration official said. “It’s generally true that Tom wants to find some way to keep working with the Taliban. I think he thinks that’s his mandate from the president,” the official said. “Rina has a more human rights-principled approach — do what we should do and let the chips fall where they may.”

To make things harder, the Taliban’s top leaders are deeply conservative Islamists who appear personally immune to most U.S. economic sanctions and travel bans; they are unlikely to have many financial assets outside Afghanistan and don’t travel much. They are said to be based in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar.

If the United States decides to cut or change humanitarian aid to Afghanistan as part of its penalties, it’s unlikely to be severe, the current official said.

U.S. officials have little — if any — contact with these top Taliban figures, which include the group’s No. 1 leader or “emir,” Haibatullah Akhundzada, said former U.S. officials in touch with the administration. Instead, U.S. officials deal with the Taliban’s more public faces in Kabul and in third party countries such as Qatar, but those people have less power.

Even if U.S. officials set aside diplomatic sensitivities and were willing to publicly engage with Akhundzada, the secretive Taliban leader is unlikely to agree to meet, former officials and analysts said.

Not all Taliban members support Akhundzada’s deeply conservative approach to women and girls’ rights. In fact, one prominent Taliban figure, Sirajuddin Haqqani, is believed to support educating girls and women, said a second current U.S. official familiar with the Afghan file. The Haqqani network is among the most violent Taliban factions.

Still, the Taliban have a strong central structure, so even more progressive elements defer to the conservative leadership, the U.S. official said. That makes it hard for the United States to sow division in the group.

Suhail Shaheen, a Taliban official, insisted to POLITICO via a WhatsApp message that the education bans were only temporary. He referred questions about the NGO work bans to another Taliban official who could not be reached for comment.

Afghan officials are “working in full swing” to ensure a “conducive environment” for women’s education, Shaheen wrote. “None is against women’s education per se, but they want women [to] receive education in an environment compliant to our values and rules,” he said, in a nod to strict Islamic law.

But the Taliban, which ruled Afghanistan for much of the 1990s, have previously claimed that such bans are temporary, only to keep schools closed to girls.

Lisa Curtis, who oversaw Afghanistan at the National Security Council in the Trump administration, argued that Biden aides should use sanctions as well as other tools to pressure the Taliban. The administration can, for instance, engage more publicly with Afghan opposition leaders or re-open the Afghan Embassy in Washington but under the control of non-Taliban figures, she said.

“It’s been almost 18 months. The Taliban has not changed,” she said. “At some point there has to be consequences.”

Others outside the Biden team, however, said it would be a mistake to further isolate the militant movement. In the long run, for the good of all Afghans, engagement is critical, said a former U.S. official familiar with the issue.

“We need to own up to the fact that our policy of shrilly criticizing them every five minutes isn’t working,” the former official said.

A former U.S. diplomat also familiar with the Afghan file argued that one approach is for the United States to lower its profile and empower institutions such as the United Nations to pressure the militant rulers.

The current strategy isn’t working, the former diplomat said, and in the meantime, “this country has so grievously erased the basic rights of half its citizens.”

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California on alert for floods and mudslides as powerful storms hit state with heavy rain, wind

Authorities across California focused Thursday on clearing roads and restoring power following heavy rain and winds that gusted to 101 miles per hour during the latest in a series of storms buffeting the state.

A disaster declaration from Gov. Gavin Newsom remained in effect as the state Office of Emergency Services expanded deployment teams up and down the state — mostly near hills scarred by recent wildfires — in case of dangerous debris flows.

The storms are bringing badly needed rain to a state experiencing historic drought conditions but also testing disaster response and the vast network of dams, levees and canals that provide water to the state and protect it from potentially catastrophic flooding.

At least six deaths have been linked to the storm, including a 2-year-old boy who died Wednesday evening in Sonoma County after a tree fell on a mobile home, said Sonoma County Sheriff’s Department Sgt. Juan Valencia. A 19-year-old woman died in the San Francisco Bay-area city of Fairfield after crashing into a utility pole, according to police.

The bodies of at least two people were found in or near vehicles that were caught in floodwaters when a New Year’s Eve storm closed a major highway in an agricultural area south of Sacramento.

Winds gusted to 50 to 60 mph in the Central Valley, with the strongest gusts hitting Marin County north of San Francisco, said Cynthia Palmer, a National Weather Service meteorologist.

The winds downed trees and knocked out power across large swaths of Northern California, and about 142,000 homes remained without power on Thursday, according to tracking site poweroutage.us.

Twenty-four-hour rainfall averages ranged from under 1 inch to more than 4 inches across the state, with Northern California counties receiving the most precipitation. Rains picked up in Southern California as well, prompting flood warnings.

Heavy rains are expected to continue into next week as multiple systems meteorologists call atmospheric rivers arrive. As long as the rains keep steady, risks of debris flows are relatively low, said Scott Rowe, an NWS lead meteorologist in Sacramento. The risks come from heavy and fast rainfalls that tend to come with thunderstorms, Rowe said.

Steady rains, ideally with some drying breaks in between, also will help refill the state’s low reservoirs and could ultimately ease the state’s deep drought situation.

But so far, they’re coming more quickly than that, Palmer said.

“Our grounds are saturated, we're not getting much if any drying between storms,” Palmer said. “Any rain that falls is going to run off. We are expecting additional potential for flooding across the area.”

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Biden's regulators propose banning non-competes

The Federal Trade Commission on Thursday kicked off the process for regulating non-compete clauses in employment agreements, issuing a proposed rule that would largely ban the practice.

Under the proposal, the FTC would still allow employers other legal avenues to protect trade secrets and other sensitive information. However, those non-disclosure agreements cannot be so broadly construed as to functionally serve as non-compete clauses, according to the agency.

“We're not talking about your run-of-the-mill NDA,” Elizabeth Wilkins, the FTC’s director of policy planning, said on a press call Wednesday previewing the action. “We are looking at things where an employer is trying to get around the rule with other words.”

The FTC is also looking to prohibit other types of employment provisions under the rule that have the same effect as a non-compete. That could include requirements to repay training expenses if a worker leaves a company within a certain time period.

The FTC’s proposal would extend to nearly all work arrangements, including unpaid or volunteer positions, apprentices and independent contractors, in addition to regular employees.

The proposal fulfills a key pillar of President Joe Biden’s competition policy agenda from last year. In a sprawling executive order from July 2021 the White House directed the entirety of the federal government to prioritize work involving competition policy and enforcement, particularly in labor markets. That specifically included a rulemaking effort by the FTC on non-compete clauses.

Non-competes are a “widespread and often exploitative practice that suppresses wages, hampers innovation, and blocks entrepreneurs from starting new businesses,” the agency said in a statement.

The FTC estimates that banning the practice could put close to $300 billion back in the pockets of workers each year, as well as boost the career opportunities for about 30 million Americans.

“It is an individual problem for a worker, but it is an aggregate problem for the economy,” FTC Chair Lina Khan told reporters on Wednesday's call.

In written statements, Khan and Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter, highlighted not only the effect of non-competes on wages but also on innovation and new business formation.

"This in turn reduces product quality while raising prices," Khan wrote, saying that in the health care sector alone, banning non-competes could lower consumer prices by as much as $150 billion each year.

The FTC commissioners voted 3-1 along partisan lines to issue the proposal, with the agency’s lone Republican commissioner Christine Wilson voting no.

In a written statement, Wilson said her fellow commissioners are departing “from hundreds of years of legal precedent that employs a fact-specific inquiry into whether a non-compete clause is unreasonable,” and instead is proposing a near-blanket ban on the practice. Wilson also questioned whether the agency has the constitutional authority to issue the rules, and said a recent U.S. Supreme Court opinion limiting the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority dooms the FTC’s efforts on non-competes.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce also criticized the proposal, saying the agency lacks authority to issue the rule and that it ignores the benefits of the practice.

“Attempting to ban noncompete clauses in all employment circumstances overturns well-established state laws which have long governed their use and ignores the fact that, when appropriately used, noncompete agreements are an important tool in fostering innovation and preserving competition," Sean Heather, U.S. Chamber of Commerce senior vice president for international regulatory affairs and antitrust, said in a statement.

According to the other three commissioners, in many cases, employers leverage their outsized bargaining power to compel workers into signing these contracts, such as by making them a condition for receiving severance pay or part of an employment agreement.

“For too long, coercive noncompete agreements have unfairly denied millions of working people the freedom to change jobs, negotiate for better pay, and start new businesses," Sarah Miller, who heads up the antimonopoly group American Economic Liberties Project, said in a statement.

Khan said that one reason for the rulemaking was the increased utilization of non-compete agreements across a broader segment of the American workforce in recent decades.

“These are no longer just being used in the boardroom, but are now basically proliferated across the economy,” she said.

The FTC estimates that roughly one-in-five workers are subject to non-competes, Khan said.

In a tweet, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who chair's the Senate Finance Committee, said "non-compete clauses are anti-worker and anti-American, plain and simple. I’m glad the [FTC] is moving to end this practice and level the playing field for American workers."

As a precursor, the FTC on Wednesday announced enforcement actions against two glass companies and a pair of related security firms over their use of non-competes.

States including California, North Dakota and Oklahoma, as well as the District of Columbia have already outlawed the use of non-compete agreements, and other states restrict their use among certain groups of workers.

The process to write and implement a rule can be lengthy, and includes public comments and potential legal challenges. A final rule will likely not be in place until at least 2024. The FTC will open the proposal for two months of public comments and the rule will take effect six months after a final version is published.

The FTC frequently uses its rulemaking authority to enforce its consumer protection mandate, including recently proposed regulations governing privacy and data security practices. The last time the agency issued a competition rule, however, was in 1967, governing “discriminatory Practices in Men's and Boys’ Tailored Clothing Industry.” The rule was never enforced, and rescinded in 1994.

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GOP debates: Who could take McCarthy's place?

If not Kevin McCarthy, then who?

It’s the all-consuming question that has started openly percolating among the House GOP, as McCarthy’s speaker bid stalls.

So far, though, Justin Amash — a former congressman who switched from Republican to Independent in 2019 and is considered a gadfly among his former colleagues — is all they’re getting, at least publicly. It’s a sign of the uncharted waters House Republicans are currently navigating as they continue to punt the speaker’s race.

“They are not able to choose a speaker right now and I think this can play out in a lot of ways. And it makes sense to be here to offer an option,” said Amash, who roamed the chamber and held court with reporters Wednesday after flying in from Michigan.

But the fact that McCarthy’s bid is in such peril that a former Freedom Caucus member-turned-independent felt emboldened to preen about the Capitol on Wednesday, points to the larger political, and mathematical, gymnastics the conference is facing: If not McCarthy, who else could win near-total support of the Republican conference — and actually wants the job?

As one GOP member summed up the party’s existential dilemma: “Kevin doesn’t have the votes, but no one has more votes than Kevin.”

It’s a question with no clear answer and plenty of opportunity for chaos. While Republicans acknowledge they are privately throwing around names among themselves, there’s a persistent elephant in the room — McCarthy himself — that means they will remain largely hypothetical until the California Republican drops out.

And the GOP leader isn’t looking to remove himself anytime soon.

“I haven’t heard any [names] and I hope there won't be any, because he is it,”said McCarthy ally Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.). “We’re not backing off.”

Ambitious GOP lawmakers who harbor their own gavel dreams know making a move now would be viewed as knifing McCarthy and alienating his allies. And with no “consensus” pick waiting in the wings, any speaker hopeful would need to solve the same Rubik’s cube of vote-counting that’s proved elusive to McCarthy so far.

Members admit that with McCarthy still in the running, it is tough to get a clear idea of another possibility, one who could match his fundraising prowess among other skills.

"There's a number of names that have been floating about but we can't actually get to that as long as Kevin says he's going to keep running indefinitely,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), one of the Freedom Caucus members opposing McCarthy thus far, told Fox News’ Laura Ingraham when asked if he’d prefer the House GOP’s No. 2, Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.).

If McCarthy does drop out, Scalise is the most obvious fall-back option. He has been adamant that he’s backing the California Republican, but he’s also in a tricky position. While he is likely the second most popular member in the conference — one who has also had his eye on the gavel in the past — he can’t have any fingerprints on the effort to take down McCarthy, or he’ll earn fierce and swift backlash from the Californian’s allies. So, he’s been laying low.

Some argue he has more conservative bonafides than McCarthy, who is still viewed skeptically by the right as a legislative chameleon despite his efforts to tie himself closely to former President Donald Trump. But others question if Scalise would be all that different in the eyes of the conservative hardliners opposing McCarthy.

Asked if a potential speaker Scalise could resolve the standoff, Jordan told reporters: "No one is talking about that."

As the GOP leader’s allies and his defectors sat down together on Wednesday evening, many of the conservatives were openly predicting that the California Republican would be forced out. Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), for instance, cryptically told reporters, “I think there's gonna be a resolution” by the time the House resumed at 8 p.m. He predicted they’d have an entirely different candidate.

Those comments helped accelerate an already-active rumor mill in GOP circles. In one call among Republican lobbyists on Wednesday, for instance, several people raised the idea that some GOP members who have publicly supported McCarthy are secretly waiting for him to drop out to rally behind Scalise — a concept that McCarthy supporters have scoffed at as ridiculous.

Another fast-moving rumor among members is that Scalise and Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) could potentially reach a deal, in which one takes the speaker's gavel and the other becomes majority leader. But, again, others denied any possibility it was true.

That increasingly active whisper network points to the current highly volatile nature of the GOP, which may end another day of speaker votes without a resolution.

Rep. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.), too, dismissed the idea that any other members had been floated for the House’s top post, declaring some members’ motto: “Only Kevin.” But as for the path forward, he said he had no idea: “I’m out of answers. Seriously. That’s the kind of situation we’re in right now.”

While some of the McCarthy opposition is personal, his detractors aren’t yet ready to bear hug Scalise as an alternative. Some are privately questioning how backing the Lousianian, particularly if he makes them the same offer on the rules that McCarthy has, wouldn’t just be rearranging deck chairs.

One McCarthy opponent told POLITICO, on condition of anonymity, that they would be willing to have conversations with Scalise but whoever came next would have to back “structural reforms” that conservatives are pushing for. If such demands include allowing one member to force a vote on deposing a speaker then that candidate, too, would be hobbling their speakership before it even began.

And some of McCarthy’s strongest backers are warning that they don’t view Scalise as the alternative if conservatives force the GOP leader out of the race.

Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.), who stressed that he was all for McCarthy as long as he’s in the race, said he viewed backing Scalise as a Plan B as letting “a small group hold us hostage.”

“I love Steve,” Bacon said. “[But] I just don’t want to cave to these guys who are holding us hostage. …They’re just looking for a scalp on Kevin.”

Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) added that he believes no other Republicans besides McCarthy could get the votes needed to win the speaker’s gavel. That, in his mind, includes Scalise.

If McCarthy drops out, Fitzpatrick said the conference will have to look beyond its current roster.

“It would set a terrible precedent in our conference if you put all that work in, accomplish the mission [to gain the House majority] and then get jettisoned at the 11th hour,” Fitzpatrick said.

A bipartisan group of centrists members have had nascent conversations about trying to cut a deal that would elect a more moderate Republican, likely in exchange for cutting a power-sharing deal with Democrats.

In a boost to those long-shot hopes, retired Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) opened the door on Wednesday, telling Michigan reporters that it was an “intriguing proposal.”

But even centrists acknowledge their threats are unlikely, and one McCarthy’s opponents consider a bluff. And Democrats insist their members are a long way from backing McCarthy or his allies — if they ever will.

Instead, conservatives are floating their own names as they cycle through their wish list. Their dream is Jordan, a McCarthy enemy-turned-ally and conservative hero, as speaker. But Jordan has been publicly adamant for months that he does not want to be speaker and he helped nominate McCarthy this week. Plus, the moderate wing and institutionalists are already shutting that idea down.

On Wednesday, they publicly shifted their public support behind Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.), who previously made an unsuccessful bid for conference chair. But McCarthy’s detractors say Donalds isn’t likely to be their final pick. And they are already floating other potential names, most notably Republican Study Committee Chair Kevin Hern (R-Okla.), as they look to offer other alternatives.

“I don’t think anything is final until we reach 218,” said Rep. Bob Good (R-Va.), one of McCarthy’s original opponents. “Time is on our side.”

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Kennedy passes on Louisiana gubernatorial bid

Republican Sen. John Kennedy told supporters Wednesday he will forgo this year’s Louisiana governor race and stay in the U.S. Senate.

Fresh off winning a second term as senator, Kennedy said that he decided after deliberating that “at this juncture, I just think I can help my state and my country more in the Senate.”

“I have passed more bills as the lead author than any first-term senator in Louisiana's history, but, to be an effective senator, killing bad ideas is just as important as advancing good ones. I'm going to be very busy doing both,” Kennedy said in the message.

Kennedy’s decision marks the second Republican senator to pass on the race, which is a top Republican pick-up opportunity as Gov. John Bel Edwards, a Democrat, is term-limited. Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) also considered the race but decided to stay in the Senate, citing his new role as top Republican on the Senate’s Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.

Kennedy is generally more conservative than Cassidy and known for his clever quips on Capitol Hill, whereas Cassidy voted to convict Donald Trump in his impeachment trial and emerged as a key Republican negotiator in the Senate. Kennedy is a bit of a thorn in the side of GOP leaders, never holding back if he’s feeling frustrated with his party’s strategy.

Kennedy would have been a formidable entrant. He just won re-election by more than 40 percentage points, avoiding a runoff.

He also previously looked at the 2019 governors race, which Edwards won. Former Sen. David Vitter, who previously held Kennedy’s seat, lost to Edwards in 2015 and retired from the Senate.

Now with an open seat, Attorney General Jeff Landry is the top declared GOP candidate in the race, though more candidates may be on the way. Republicans are bullish about their chances to flip the otherwise red-leaning state, with the anti-abortion Edwards leaving office.

Louisiana is one of three states that is holding an election for governor in 2023, along with Kentucky and Mississippi.

Zach Montellaro contributed to this report.

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Kat Cammack draws boos over Dem booze accusations

But with the chamber unable to adopt rules, there was little to be done about the remark.

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