Gimenez Stands Firm, Maintains Support for McCarthy for Speaker

Representative Carlos Gimenez (R-FL) went on WPLG-10 News in Miami to discuss who he will support for the House Speakership. In a surprising statement, Rep. Gimenez said that he would be sticking to his guns and maintain his support for former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA).

I would hope that he (McCarthy) would reconsider and come back. And I think that he would have broad support. And it’s just a question of, can we get those eight (Republicans who voted against McCarthy) to change their mind? And then we can move on,” said Rep. Gimenez.

He would go on to mention, “We also need to change that rule – for one member to do a motion to vacate is insane. We’ve demonstrated how insane it really is. And we need to change that rule. And so, any way that we move forward, that rule has to change and if I had my druthers, I’d like to see Kevin McCarthy back in that seat.”

The Florida congressman said he would only support anyone else if McCarthy endorsed someone else.

Just last week, Gimenez stated that he would not support anyone at all for Speaker unless the rules have been changed.

He then proceeded to get into a social media war with Representative Matt Gaetz (R-FL).

“The person who wants my vote for Speaker must commit to reforming the Motion to Vacate,” said Rep. Gimenez in a press release. “The threshold must be raised to 50% of the Republican Conference. The coup against Speaker Kevin McCarthy was despicable and must never happen again. A Speaker cannot govern under constant threat by fringe hostage takers.”

Rep. Gaetz responded to this position in a post of his own:

So the way moderates want to punish me is by making it harder to remove Speaker Jordan or Speaker Scalise? OH NO! ANYTHING BUT THAT!!!” said Gaetz.

Rep. Gimenez replied, “This isn’t a kindergarten classroom.”

“Matt, this isn’t a kindergarten classroom. No one gets punished around here. It’s about doing what’s right. I’m glad to know that you’ll be on board with increasing the threshold to 50%!” stated Gimenez.

For the record, it does not appear that Rep. Gaetz is in favor of increasing the threshold to 50%.

Recently, Gimenez described Gaetz as “Joe Biden’s favorite Republican.”

When asked if he supported expelling Rep. Gaetz, as some Republicans seek to do, Rep. Gimenez answered that he would look at the charges first, as "expelling a member of the House is a very serious concern."

"And I have serious disagreements with Mr. Gaetz. I think that he is actually Joe Biden's favorite Republican because he causes a lot of confusion and dissension inside the Party itself. If it were not for Matt Gaetz, we would have had a funding resolution that actually controlled the border and would have had close to 10% cuts in government, but because of Matt Gaetz, we did not get either of those," said Rep. Gimenez.

Currently, Reps. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Steve Scalise (R-LA) are the candidates to replace former Speaker McCarthy.