By David Morgan and Moira Warburton and Andy Sullivan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republican Kevin McCarthy was elected speaker of the U.S. House earlier on Saturday after making major concessions to a group of hard-line right-wing lawmakers who raise questions about the party’s ability to govern.
McCarthy’s victory in the 15th round of voting ended Congress’s deepest dysfunction in more than 160 years, but it starkly illustrated the difficulties he will have in leading a tight and very polarized majority.
He ultimately won 216-212, and managed to be elected with the votes of less than half of the House members only because six lawmakers from his own party abstained – not supporting McCarthy as leader, but also not voting for another candidate.
By picking up the gavel for the first time, McCarthy spelled the end of President Joe Biden’s Democratic control of both houses of Congress.
“Our system is built on checks and balances. It’s time for us to be a brake and provide some counterweight to the president’s policies,” McCarthy said in his inaugural address, which laid out a wide range of priorities from cutting immigration spending to tackling culture wars.
McCarthy was elected only after agreeing to a hard-line group’s demand that any lawmaker can ask him to leave office at any time. That will greatly reduce the power he will have to pass bills on critical issues such as government funding, addressing the country’s looming debt ceiling and other crises that may arise.
Republicans’ weaker-than-expected performance in midterm elections in November left them with a narrow 222-212 majority, giving outsized power to right-wing lawmakers who oppose McCarthy’s leadership.
Those concessions, which include steep spending cuts and other restrictions on McCarthy’s powers, could point to more turmoil in the coming months, especially when Congress must pass yet another $31.4 trillion debt extension.
Over the past decade, Republicans have repeatedly shut down much of government and driven the world’s biggest debtor to the brink of default in an attempt to extract drastic spending cuts, often without success.
(Reporting by David Morgan, Moira Warburton and Andy Sullivan; Additional reporting by Gram Slattery, Jason Lange and Makini Brice)
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