- Rep. Adam Kinzinger says Kevin McCarthy looks like a 'feckless, weak, tired man.'
- McCarthy is aiming for the speakership if Republicans win back the House in 2022.
- Kinzinger predicted McCarthy will be "hostage" and "subservient" to far-right GOP members.
Rep. Adam Kinzinger said House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy "looks like a feckless, weak, tired man" over his leadership of the Republican caucus in an interview on The Bulwark's podcast.
McCarthy is well-positioned to be elected as Speaker of the House should Republicans win back the chamber in the 2022 midterms. But doing so means he has to satisfy and placate powerful right-wing members closely aligned with former President Donald Trump, members who hold a significant amount of sway and influence within the caucus and the party as a whole.
"I've been clear about my thoughts on Kevin McCarthy," Kinzinger told The Bulwark's Charlie Sykes. "Even if he does somehow become speaker, he's going to have to have a good cell phone plan because he will be calling Marjorie Taylor Greene every day asking her what he can and can't do. I mean, my goodness, having the title of speaker but being subservient to a sophomore in Congress who's crazy…why would you even do that?"
"The Republicans may win the majority, but that is going to be, I think, when he is hostage to Marjorie Taylor Greene, probably do more damage to the Republican Party than even anything in the next year," Kinzinger, who is retiring from Congress after 2022, added.
Sykes likened a potential McCarthy speakership to a "monkey's paw speakership where you get what you wanted, but wow, it didn't turn out the way you thought it was going to be."
Kinzinger said McCarthy's first strategic mistake was quietly backing the effort to remove Cheney from her previous position in House leadership as GOP conference chairwoman. McCarthy and Cheney's relationship deteriorated after she voted to impeach former President Donald Trump over the January 6 insurrection and forcefully spoke out against the former president.
The Republican caucus voted to oust Cheney as their leader in May and replace her with Rep. Elise Stefanik, a close Trump ally.
"I ended up following Liz out. She walked out of that room, went out and talked to the press, and gave her statement basically, to paraphrase: 'I'll do anything to make sure Donald Trump does not retake over the Republican Party,'" Kinzinger recalled of the day of the vote.
"And I remember at that moment just thinking, 'Kevin McCarthy has just empowered his greatest enemy,'" Kinzinger added. "Because he thought she would away. And I gotta tell you, she ain't going away. And instead, he looks like a feckless, weak, tired man, who is doing the bidding of whatever Marjorie Taylor Greene thinks is going to raise her money that day."
Kinzinger also argued on the podcast that McCarthy made a strategic miscalculation in opposing a proposal to create an independent, bipartisan, 9/11-style commission to investigate the January 6 attack on the Capitol.
After Senate Republicans voted against an independent January 6 commission, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi formed the Select Committee. McCarthy withdrew all his GOP picks for the Select Committee in protest, leaving Cheney and Kinzinger, both appointed by Pelosi, as the sole GOP members on the panel.
The January 6 Committee has since moved aggressively to subpoena hundreds of thousands of documents and hundreds of key witnesses, including former aides to Trump and Pence. The panel plans on holding public hearings on its findings this spring.
"Had this been the quote-unquote fair commission thing, this would have all been behind the scenes, you would end up with a report similar to the 9/11 report, and you wouldn't have to deal with this on a day-to-day basis," Kinzinger argued.
Kinzinger said McCarthy tanking the independent commission was "one of the worst, in terms of raw strategy, decisions that he's made."
"He didn't believe that Liz Cheney would jump on to the committee. And he ultimately, after he pulled his members, did not believe that I would take an appointment to occupy the Republican seats," Kinzinger added. "There are so many things way more important than keeping a job in Congress — like the future of the country."