Fox News’s Bret Baier Details ‘One Way’ McCarthy Can Still Become Speaker If GOP Rebels Don’t Budge

Fox News anchors Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum joined Outnumbered on Thursday to give breaking news commentary as Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) looked poised to fail to secure the House speakership on a seventh vote.

After a lengthy discussion about what the GOP anti-McCarthy House members’ motivations are, anchor Harris Faulkner asked Baier about McCarthy’s options.

“Yeah. So Bret what is the difference? I mean, Nancy Pelosi, you can find out what’s in the bill once we pass it. I mean, she was like the Honey Badger of House speakers. Can you be that if you’re Kevin McCarthy now, can you just be bold?” asked Faulkner.

“No,” replied Baier.

“No?” shot back Faulkner.

“No,” Baier doubled down.

“I’m the only one that thinks that? Because everyone on the couch is saying no,” Faulkner added talking over Baier.

“You think that John Boehner had it tough? You think that Paul Ryan had it tough with a, you know, Tea Party or a recalcitrant, you know, wave of the party that said we’re not going to do this? And they stand up and block two different bills,” Baier continued, adding:

Just wait. Just wait when the debt ceiling battle comes down the pike, just wait until other controversial legislation comes down. He will not have a lot of power. And that’s what I think he was trying to protect, but he has negotiated away. Well, you have, Bob Good telling reporters today. I will always vote against Kevin McCarthy. Always. You just had Matt Gaetz vote for former President Trump. That’s one of the others. Gates voted for Trump as speaker.

“And so, listen, there’s one way that this could be solved, and that is the negotiation includes Democrats. There’s some kind of thing that happens as far as what they get. I don’t know what it is, but 40 of them vote present and then the majority to win becomes 198 and Kevin McCarthy becomes speaker because the magic number shifts from 218 to 198,” Baier explained, noting that House speaker only needs a majority of those voting to be elected.

“Yeah, it’s possible. But that means that he’s giving up a lot to Democrats and that would cost him inside his caucus,” Baier noted, however.

MacCallum replied warning that McCarthy would have to be “very careful because Jeffries could get that number too. So, that’s a very tricky game when you start picking your exact number of present votes and how it’s going to work.”

Watch the full clip above via Fox News