NBC’s Kristen Welker Confronts Matt Gaetz With an Old Clip Where Bashed the Idea of Removing House Speaker

NBC News’ Kristen Welker pressed Congressman Matt Gaetz (R-FL) on the fallout from his successful push to oust House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. She did so by noting there was once a time when Gaetz believed that forcing out the House speaker would only divide the GOP into competing factions.

Gaetz joined Welker on Sunday for Meet The Press, where he was confronted on whether his revolution against McCarthy was “irresponsible” when it remains to be seen who would be able to replace McCarthy. McCarthy’s ouster has sparked significant discussion about Gaetz’s political volitility in the House, though Welker noted that Gaetz gave a Fox Business interview back in 2018 where he was not in favor of the effort to replace former Speaker Paul Ryan.

“If we take Paul Ryan off the field right now,” Gaetz warned five years ago, “instead of being able to finish strong in the 115th Congress, we will shatter into a bunch of factions fighting for power. We’ve got enough of that in Washington already.”

This prompted Welker to ask: “Where was that concern for party unity on Tuesday?”

“We’re in a very different position today than we were back then,” Gaetz answered. “We had a leader who had made multiple contradictory promises that nobody could trust. So there was no way to move forward. Paul Ryan was in a quite different position in 2018, and you’re not seeing factions divided.”

Gaetz continued to reject the idea of the GOP’s balkanization by insisting that the Republican caucus is “invigorated” and lining up behind Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), who entered the running to succeed McCarthy. Gaetz has been enthusiastic about his “hero” Jordan becoming the speaker, and Jordan has defended Gaetz from those demanding the Florida rep’s expulsion for sparking the anti-McCarthy revolt.

Watch above via NBC.