The House GOP will hold internal leadership elections on Nov. 15, one day after returning for the lame-duck session and as the conservative Republican faction weighs whether they will back House Speaker Paul Ryan for another term with the gavel.
The office of House Conference Committee Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rogers, R-Wa., announced on Wednesday that a candidates forum with House GOP lawmakers will take place on Monday, Nov. 14, with elections held the next day.
Both events are closed-door and off limits to the press, but the outcome of the election is typically announced quickly.
The announcement came soon after members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus broke from a private meeting on Capitol Hill, where they discussed whether to back Ryan in the lame-duck session and how to stop the House GOP from pushing a rules change that would make it much harder for an individual member to call for the removal of the speaker.
Freedom Caucus members want the leadership elections to take place after the lame-duck session in an effort to improve their leverage during the debate over a long-term spending measure for fiscal 2017.
But the GOP leadership is clearly eager to move ahead with the elections and have followed with tradition. Leadership elections typically take place in the November and December time frame.
The conference will elect a candidate for speaker and will chose their majority leader, majority whip and conference committee chairperson.
All four incumbents in those positions — Ryan, Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., Majority Whip Steven Scalise, R-La., and McMorris Rodgers — plan to run for another term.
Among the leaders, Ryan may be in the most peril.
That’s because he must be elected by not only his GOP rank-and-file, but the full House, including Democrats, during a roll-call vote on the opening day of the 115th Congress in January.
If the GOP majority is very slim, Republicans can afford to lose only a few GOP votes to elect Ryan speaker, which requires a majority vote.
