Speaking to reporters, Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) reacted to the ousting of Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) from the Speaker role.
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00:00 Yeah, it's morning. I don't know whether it's good.
00:03 Wanted to see what just generally what you make of what's going on in the
00:08 house. Do you think it was the right move for that small group of
00:12 conservatives to ask Speaker McCarthy yesterday?
00:14 Well,
00:18 um,
00:20 a wise man once said nothing because he's a wise man. I'm very reluctant to
00:28 give my house colleagues advice. I will just make a couple of observations.
00:35 Number one,
00:36 um,
00:37 Congress is an institution, and it has the right to change its leadership.
00:44 Sometime like democracy that's messy. Right now, the house has temporary
00:51 leadership, and I think it's very important for the house, like, you know,
00:56 yesterday to get permanent leadership. And I think a lot of this will will
01:03 call permanent leadership will cause things to settle down. Number two, it
01:08 should not go unnoticed that Speaker McCarthy said I'm not gonna run. Um,
01:16 it I consider that to be a selfless act. Um, I think if McCarthy did run, I
01:26 don't know whether he could win or not. That's none of my business. But the
01:29 fact that he was willing to say I'm out of this, I think will go a long way
01:34 toward toward settling things down. And I thank you for that. And I guess the
01:39 third point is to my colleagues in the house, you know, follow your heart, but
01:45 take your brain with you. How do you think this reflects on the GOP? I don't
01:49 know. I mean, short term, um, it's it's messy. There's no don't denying that.
01:56 But I look, the American people are angry and they're divided. Uh, the
02:07 anger is on both sides. Um, I think it's unreasonable to expect Congress,
02:15 which represents the American people to be any different. But there could be
02:20 productive anger and there could be destructive anger. And I believe I've
02:25 got enough confidence being an optimist who worries that Congress will turn
02:30 this into constructive anger.
02:32 Alright, we gotta go guys. Thank you very much.