House GOP lawmakers are refusing to accept Rep. Paul Ryan’s decision to forgo a run for speaker, and the Wisconsin Republican is now leaning toward the job, according to high-ranking members who have spoken to him.
“I think he feels a responsibility to do it,” House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers, R-Ky., told the Washington Examiner.
Rogers is among the lawmakers who has personally appealed to the Wisconsin lawmaker to run for the job. Rogers told Ryan he is the only House Republican who can bridge the discord within the conference and win the 218 votes needed to win the speaker’s gavel in a House floor vote.
Rogers said while Ryan is “perfectly happy” churning out tax policy as House Ways and Means Committee chair, “his sense of duty, patriotism if you will, is very strong.”
Ryan told GOP lawmakers in an early morning meeting that he had no plans to run for speaker. But that has not stopped a growing Ryan recruitment effort from taking hold of the GOP conference.
Leading the effort is House Speaker John Boehner, who wants to retire on Oct. 30 and believes Ryan is the only one who can win the votes to succeed him.
“The speaker is begging him,” Rogers said.
Ryan, 45, has taken a mostly below-the-radar role in the party since running unsuccessfully for vice president on the 2012 Republican ticket with Mitt Romney.
Returning to Congress, he won his dream job, chairing the House Ways and Means Committee, in 2015. He is now positioned to play a pivotal role in comprehensive tax reform or even entitlement reform, if the GOP can win the White House in 2016 and hold onto the majority in both chambers.
The job of House speaker is much different and takes Ryan out of his comfort zone of numbers and charts. It instead involves bridging differences within the fractious conference and making frequent fundraising trips across the country.
Ryan, the father of three young children, has cited his family as one of the main reasons he does not want the job. But despite his resistance, by the close of House floor business Friday, the Ryan drumbeat only grew louder.
Rep. Bill Huizenga, R-Mich. is among the lawmakers who approached Ryan and asked him to run for the job. He’s started a #Runpaulrun hashtag on twitter.
Huizenga said a group of lawmakers have told Ryan they would work to protect him from attacks from the right.
“I’m going to go with the guy who I have the highest trust level,” Huizenga said. “A number of us have told him we are going to be there for him, we are going to surround him and pick up as much slack as we can, whether it’s stuff on the political side.”
Huizenga said Ryan would not necessarily have to surrender his role on legislation that Ways and Means has been working on.
“I still believe he can drive tax policy and welfare reform from where he would be sitting,” he said.
But a Ryan candidacy would likely encounter the same resistance from conservatives that seemed to contribute to Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s decision to suddenly quit the race on Thursday.
Conservatives tell the Examiner they’ll consider Ryan, but he’s no shoo-in. They are seeking, among other things, significant changes to the GOP leadership style and assurances he’ll espouse conservative principles they feel Boehner and McCarthy lacked.
“We are waiting to see if he announces,” said Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C. “He certainly has been one who is open to having a good, rigorous debate.”
Ryan won’t say publicly if he’s mulling the job. He left the Capitol Friday talking about the Green Bay Packers home game on Sunday and made no mention of anything else on his plate this weekend, according to reporters who chased him out.
Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, said other potential candidates are holding off getting into the race because they are not sure what Ryan is going to do.
“I’d love for him to run,” Sessions said. “He needs to give us his final answer.”
