Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich said Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) “unleashed the demons” with his motion to vacate then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy last October, creating a “disaster” for the House Republican Conference ever since.
Gingrich joined Fox News host Laura Ingraham on The Ingraham Angle on Friday to discuss the recent retirement announcement of Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI), who joins a growing line of GOP representatives who have decided to leave Congress before the ends of their terms. That news came hours after the House passed a bipartisan $1.2 trillion spending bill, which prompted Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene to file a motion to vacate Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), not even five months after he replaced the ousted McCarthy.
“We shouldn’t underestimate how bad what Matt Gaetz did was for the whole system,” Gingrich said. “He unleashed the demons. He went after somebody who had raised $480 million, had gained seats for three elections in a row, and he drove Kevin McCarthy out of office. And from that point on, it has been a disaster.”
Gingrich said he did not blame Johnson for the House’s ineffectiveness because he was dealt “a hand that’s virtually impossible to play.” The former speaker argued that the state of affairs in the lower chamber is the best argument he has seen to elect former President Donald Trump to a second term in the White House and a larger majority in the House.
“When I was speaker, I had a lot more ability than Johnson did to run the House ‘cause I had a big enough majority you could have five or 10 people who were crazy and you could still govern,” Gingrich said. “He doesn’t have a one-vote majority. The fact is there are eight or 10 or 12 people who are going to get up every morning voting no. The truth is they don’t even know what they’re voting on.”
He continued to rail against members of the House Freedom Caucus for their unproductive behavior, including Greene’s motion to vacate Johnson after the appropriations bill, which has since passed the Senate and been signed by President Joe Biden, passed.
“The bills have been worse since McCarthy was gone, the Democrats are in greater control, the hard-liners on the right have done nothing except make it worse, the Freedom Caucus right now has been a disaster in public policy terms,” Gingrich said. “If you think your job in life is to grandstand and complain while the other team runs over you, they’re doing a great job.”
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Ingraham pressed Gingrich on Gallagher’s retirement, which brought the number of early departures to five within the House GOP, but he still chose to focus on Gaetz, Greene, and others of that ilk.
“I’m equally disappointed in the people who are leaving and in the people who are destructing and have no positive solutions,” Gingrich said. “And I have no greater respect for them — stay so that you can have a temper tantrum is not particularly more helpful than going home.”
