In a post published on Wednesday morning on his official profile on Truth Social, the former president wrote: “Some really good conversations took place last night, and it’s now time for all of our GREAT Republican House Members to VOTE FOR KEVIN, CLOSE THE DEAL, TAKE THE VICTORY, & WATCH CRAZY NANCY PELOSI FLY BACK HOME TO A VERY BROKEN CALIFORNIA,THE ONLY SPEAKER IN U.S. HISTORY TO HAVE LOST THE “HOUSE” TWICE!
“REPUBLICANS, DO NOT TURN A GREAT TRIUMPH INTO A GIANT & EMBARRASSING DEFEAT. IT’S TIME TO CELEBRATE, YOU DESERVE IT,” Trump added. “Kevin McCarthy will do a good job, and maybe even a GREAT JOB - JUST WATCH!”
Another message published shortly after on Truth Social invited Republicans to “take the victory and run.”
Trump had blamed the current “unnecessary turmoil”—as he called it—within the GOP on Senator Mitch McConnell and wife Elaine Chao, whom he accused of making “it difficult for everyone else.”
Trump’s show of support for McCarthy on Wednesday was followed by a repeated accusation against McConnell and Chao. In a Truth Social post following the one asking House Republicans to support McCarthy’s bid to become House speaker, Trump called for his fellow Republicans to focus instead on opposing McConnell and Chao.
“If Republicans are going to fight, we ought to be fighting Mitch McConnell and his domineering, China loving BOSS, I mean his wife, Coco Chow,” he wrote, using a racist slur that he has used to refer to Chao before. “The harm they have done to the Republican Party is incalculable.”
Newsweek has contacted Trump, McConnell and Chao for comment.
The House is set to reconvene on Wednesday at noon local time, when McCarthy is expected to pick up his fight after he failed three times to obtain a majority vote on Tuesday.
McCarthy’s defeat marked the first time in a century that the House of Representatives has failed to elect a speaker on the first roll-call vote.
However, former House speaker and Republican Newt Gingrich told Fox News that he was “not shaken” by the failure to elect a speaker on Tuesday, pointing to the nine ballots it took in 1923 and “133 ballots to pick a Speaker in 1855. So this is not unprecedented.”
