CNN’s Manu Raju Lays Out Emmer’s Tough Road to Speaker — Including GOP Anger at His Support For Same-Sex Marriage

Alex GriffingOct 24th, 2023, 1:07 pm

CNN’s chief congressional correspondent Manu Raju laid out the difficult road ahead for GOP House Whip Rep. Tom Emmer (R-MN) to become House speaker after winning the GOP conference nomination on Tuesday.

Raju spoke with Rep. Rick Allen (R-GA) ahead of the vote and asked him how he felt “about his [Emmer’s] vote on same-sex marriage.”

“Very concerned,” Allen replied, referring to Emmer’s vote to codify same-sex and interracial marriage into U.S. law.

“Could you vote against him?” Raju pressed.

“Yes,” Allen shot back.

“Would you? Are you going to. Is there any way you would vote for him?” Raju followed up.

“No,” Allen replied.

“So that is the same warning sign that Emmer has that other candidates before him have, winning the Republican nomination, but unable to get the votes on the House floor,” Raju then noted, adding:

We’ll see if it comes to that or whether Emmer is able to get 217 votes or any of these candidates for the moment the goal is to get a majority of the conference, to get the nomination, get elected speaker, and try to move forward amid this leadership crisis that has paralyzed the House.

Raju also caught up with House Freedom Caucus Chairman Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA) who said, “I’m concerned about that,” when asked about Emmer’s positions on various spending bills.

Scott Perry, leader of the House Freedom Caucus, said he “never” says “never” against a particular candidate but makes clear he has concerns about Tom Emmer’s votes on spending bills. “I’m concerned about that,” he said this AM pic.twitter.com/MIEaHmvs9d

— Manu Raju (@mkraju) October 24, 2023

After securing the nomination for speaker, Raju spoke with other House members about his chances, reporting:

GOP Rep. Meuser told us “there are some holdouts” to Tom@Emmer’s speaker bid, saying there are “around 10” members opposed to him in the closed-door roll call vote currently underway. He can only afford to lose four Rs in party-line vote

Emmer must win 217 GOP votes if every member of the House votes and all the Democrats vote together for their candidate, meaning he can only lose 4 GOP votes, and with Allen a hard “no,” he can only lose 3 more.

Raju later reported that the House GOP Conference is likely to hold another secret ballot to see if Emmer has enough votes to win the speakership before a floor vote.

Watch the full clip above via CNN.