Politics

WASHINGTON (AP) — House Republicans pondered next moves at a political crossroads Thursday after leader Kevin McCarthy failed over and over to win enough votes from party colleagues to become House speaker, He kept meeting with conservative holdouts and remained determined to persuade enough of them to end the stalemate.

What started as a political novelty, the first time in 100 years a nominee had not won the gavel on the first vote, has devolved into a bitter Republican Party feud and deepening potential crisis.

McCarthy is under growing pressure from restless Republicans, and Democrats, to find the votes he needs or step aside, so the House can open fully and get on with the business of governing. His right-flank detractors appear intent on waiting him out, as long as it takes.

“No deal yet,” McCarthy said late Wednesday before the House abruptly adjourned. “But a lot of progress.”

The House, which is one-half of Congress, is essentially at a standstill as McCarthy has failed, one vote after another, to win the speaker’s gavel in a grueling spectacle for all the world to see. The ballots have produced almost the same outcome, 20 conservative holdouts still refusing to support him and leaving him far short of the 218 typically needed to win the gavel.

In fact, McCarthy saw his support slipping to 201, as one fellow Republican switched to vote simply present.

“I think people need to work a little more,” McCarthy said Wednesday as they prepared to adjourn for the night. “I don’t think a vote tonight would make any difference. But a vote in the future could.”

When the House resumes at noon Thursday it could be a long day. The new Republican majority was not expected to be in session on Friday, which is the anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. A prolonged and divisive speaker’s fight would almost certainly underscore the fragility of American democracy after the attempted insurrection two years ago.

“All who serve in the House share a responsibility to bring dignity to this body,” California Democrat Nancy Pelosi, the former speaker, said in a tweet.

Pelosi also said the Republicans’ “cavalier attitude in electing a Speaker is frivolous, disrespectful and unworthy of this institution. We must open the House and proceed with the People’s work.”

Some Republicans appear to be growing uneasy with the way House Republicans have taken charge after the midterm election only to see the chamber upended over the speaker’s race in their first days in the new majority.

Colorado Republican Ken Buck voted for McCarthy but said Wednesday that he told him “he needs to figure out how to make a deal to move forward” or eventually step aside for someone else.

McCarthy has vowed to fight to the finish for the speaker’s job in a battle that had thrown the new majority into tumult for the first days of the new Congress.

The right-flank conservatives, led by the Freedom Caucus and aligned with former President Donald Trump, appeared emboldened by the standoff — even though Trump publicly backed McCarthy,

“This is actually an invigorating day for America,” said Florida Republican Byron Donalds, who was nominated three times by his conservative colleagues as an alternative. “There’s a lot of members in the chamber who want to have serious conversations about how we can bring this all to a close and elect a speaker.”

The disorganized start to the new Congress pointed to difficulties ahead with Republicans now in control of the House, much the way that some past Republican speakers, including John Boehner, had trouble leading a rebellious right flank. The result: government shutdowns, standoffs and Boehner’s early retirement.

A new generation of conservative Republicans, many aligned with Trump’s Make America Great Again agenda, want to upend business as usual in Washington, and were committed to stopping McCarthy’s rise without concessions to their priorities.

But even Trump’s strongest supporters disagreed on this issue. Colorado Republican Lauren Boebert, who nominated Donalds the second time, called on the former president to tell McCarthy, “Sir, you do not have the votes and it’s time to withdraw.’”

By McCarthy’s own calculation, he needs to flip about a dozen Republicans who have so far withheld their backing as he presses on for the job he has long wanted.

To win support, McCarthy has already agreed to many of the demands of Freedom Caucus members, who have been agitating for rules changes and other concessions that give rank-and-file members more influence.

Mostly, the holdouts led by the Freedom Caucus are seeking ways to shrink the power of the speaker’s office and give rank-and-file lawmakers more influence in the legislative process — with seats on key committees and the ability to draft and amend bills in a more free-for-all process. McCarthy conceded to some changes in a Rules package released over New Years weekend, but for some it didn’t go far enough.

“I am open to whatever will give me the power to defend my constituents against this godforsaken city,” said Texas Republican Chip Roy, a leader of the conservative group, told reporters after leaving a lengthy meeting late Wednesday.

And a McCarthy-aligned campaign group, the Conservative Leadership Fund, offered another concession, saying it would no longer spend money on elections “in any open-seat primaries in safe Republican districts.” The far-right lawmakers have complained that their preferred candidates for the House were being treated unfairly as the campaign fund put its resources elsewhere.

Pennsylvania Republican Scott Perry, the chairman of the Freedom Caucus, said the latest round of talks was “productive.”

But those opposing McCarthy do not all have the same complaints, and he may never be able to win over some of them. A small core group of Republicans appear unwilling to ever vote for McCarthy.

“I’m ready to vote all night, all week, all month and never for that person,” said Florida Republican Matt Gaetz.

Such staunch opposition carried echoes of McCarthy’s earlier bid for the job, when he dropped out of the speaker’s race in 2015 because he could not win over conservatives.

“We have no exit strategy,” South Carolina Republican Ralph Norman said.

“There’s nothing he can give me or any of our members that’s going to be a magic pill,” Norman said. “We’re here to vet a speaker. Vet the person third in line for the presidency and that’s a good thing.”

Not since 1923 had a speaker’s election gone to multiple ballots. The longest fight for the gavel started in late 1855 and dragged on for two months, with 133 ballots, during debates over slavery in the run-up to the Civil War.

Democrats enthusiastically nominated and renominated their House leader, Hakeem Jeffries, on all six ballots for speaker over the first two days. He repeatedly won the most votes overall, 212.

If McCarthy could win 213 votes, and then persuade the remaining naysayers to simply vote present, he would be able to lower the threshold required under the rules to have the majority.

It’s a strategy former House speakers, including Pelosi and Boehner, had used when they confronted opposition, winning with fewer than 218 votes.

One Republican, Victoria Spartz of Indiana, voted present on Wednesday’s rounds, but it only ended up lowering McCarthy’s total.

___

AP writers Mary Clare Jalonick and Kevin Freking contributed to this report.

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PHOENIX (AP) — Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs will outline her vision for the next four years during her inaugural address Thursday, ushering in an era of divided government and Democratic ascendance in a state long dominated by Republicans.

Hobbs has been governor since Monday, when power transferred under the state constitution. She’ll repeat the oath of office in public Thursday at the traditional every-four-years inaugural at the state Capitol.

Hobbs rose to prominence as the secretary of state, staunchly defending the integrity of the 2020 election as former President Donald Trump and his allies tried to overturn the results or falsely claim there was rampant fraud.

She narrowly won office in November after pitching “sanity over chaos,” contrasting herself favorably against Republican Kari Lake, a former television anchor who backed Trump’s election lies and drew global media attention.

Hobbs assumes control of a state with a strong economy and a solid financial position, with a large budget surplus forecast for the next fiscal year.

But headwinds are on the horizon. Phoenix has some of the nation’s highest inflation levels and housing costs have soared as rapid population growth has outpaced home construction, belying the state’s reputation for affordability. Furthermore, the water supply is constrained by drought.

Hobbs was previously a state legislator who rose through the ranks to become the top Democrat in the Senate. As governor, she’ll have to work with a House and Senate narrowly controlled by Republicans. The GOP caucuses will move to the right after several moderate Republicans in both the House and Senate were defeated in primaries or chose not to run for re-election, getting replaced by a new generation of lawmakers spoiling for a fight not just with Democrats but more moderate members of the GOP.

The new Legislature convenes for the first time next Monday.

Outgoing Republican Gov. Doug Ducey left a letter for Hobbs saying governor “is the greatest job in politics and an immense responsibility. I know you will serve the people of Arizona well.”

Hobbs’s election is the latest victory for Democrats who steadily expanded their influence in Arizona since 2018, when Kyrsten Sinema was elected to the U.S. Senate. Sinema was then a Democrat but has since become independent after infuriating much of her party’s base.

Democrats now control the top three state offices — governor, secretary of state and attorney general — for the first time in decades, along with both U.S. Senate seats.

Lake has refused to concede and is continuing her legal fight challenging the election results and claiming on social media that elections are rigged. A Maricopa County judge rejected Lake’s claim that the election results were marred by intentional misconduct by election officials in the state’s most populous county.

The first two weeks in office are frenetic for a new governor just learning the job. Hobbs will give a second major speech just days after her inaugural address when she delivers the state of the state address on Monday, followed by her first budget proposal next Friday. Meanwhile, she has focused on staffing up her government, appointing several new state agency chiefs in recent weeks and announcing she will retain several officials originally hired by Ducey.

Hobbs signed her first executive order hours after taking office aiming to eliminate discrimination for state employees and contractors. She has outlined priorities that include water, border security, health care access, affordability, workforce development and education.

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WASHINGTON (AP) — House Republicans flailed through a long second day of fruitless balloting Wednesday, unable to either elect their leader Kevin McCarthy as House speaker or come up with a new strategy to end the political chaos that has tarnished the start of their new majority.

Yet McCarthy wasn’t giving up, even after the fourth, fifth and sixth votes produced no better outcome and he was left trying to call off a nighttime session. Even that was controversial, as the House voted 216-214 — amid shouting and crowding — to adjourn for the night.

“No deal yet,” McCarthy said shortly before that as he left a lengthy closed-door dinnertime meeting with key holdouts and his own allies. “But a lot of progress.”

No progress at all was evident though the day of vote after vote after vote as Republicans tried to elevate McCarthy into the top job. The ballots produced almost the same outcome, 20 conservative holdouts still refusing to support him and leaving him far short of the 218 typically needed to win the gavel.

In fact, McCarthy saw his support slip to 201, as one fellow Republican switched to vote simply present.

Seeing no quick way out of the political standoff, Republicans voted abruptly late in the day to adjourn for a few hours as they desperately searched for an endgame to the chaos of their own making. They were due back in the evening, but McCarthy wanted to take a break until Thursday.

“I think people need to work a little more,” McCarthy said. “I don’t think a vote tonight would make any difference. But a vote in the future could.”

McCarthy, the California Republican, vowed to fight to the finish for the speaker’s job despite the grueling spectacle, unlike any in modern times, that threw the new majority into tumult for the first days of the new Congress. Animated private discussions broke out on the chamber floor and in huddled meetings throughout the Capitol between McCarthy supporters and detractors.

“Well, it’s Groundhog Day,” said Rep. Kat Cammack, R-Fla., in nominating McCarthy on the sixth ballot.

She said, “To all Americans watching right now, We hear you. And we will get through this — no matter how messy.”

But the right-flank conservatives, led by the Freedom Caucus and aligned with Donald Trump, appeared emboldened by the standoff — though Trump publicly backed McCarthy,

“This is actually an invigorating day for America,” said Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., who was nominated three times by his conservative colleagues as an alternative. “There’s a lot of members in the chamber who want to have serious conversations about how we can bring this all to a close and elect a speaker.”

No other work could be done — swearing in new House members, forming committees, tackling legislation, investigating the Biden administration — until the speaker was elected.

As the hours churned, the dynamic proved no different from Day One, as Democrats re-upped their leader, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, for speaker, and Donalds offered his challenge to McCarthy in another history-making moment. Both Jeffries and Donalds are Black.

“This country needs leadership,” said Rep. Chip Roy, a Texas Republican noting the first time in history two African Americans were nominated for the high office. Lawmakers from both parties rose to applaud.

It was the first time in 100 years that no nominee for House speaker could take the gavel on the first vote.

The disorganized start to the new Congress pointed to difficulties ahead with Republicans now in control of the House, much the way that some past Republican speakers, including John Boehner, had trouble leading a rebellious right flank and ended up with government shutdowns, standoffs and early retirement.

Democratic President Joe Biden, departing the White House for a bipartisan event in Kentucky with Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell, said “the rest of the world is looking” at the scene on the House floor.

“I just think it’s really embarrassing it’s taking so long,” Biden said. “I have no idea” who will prevail.

Tensions flared among the new House majority as their campaign promises of competent leadership stalled out. Not since 1923 had a speaker’s election gone to multiple ballots. The longest and most grueling fight for the gavel started in late 1855 and dragged on for two months, with 133 ballots, during debates over slavery in the run-up to the Civil War.

A new generation of conservative Republicans, many aligned with Trump’s Make America Great Again agenda, want to upend business as usual in Washington, and were committed to stopping McCarthy’s rise without concessions to their priorities.

But even Trump’s strongest supporters disagreed on this issue. Rep. Lauren Boebert, a firm Colorado conservative who nominated Donalds the second time, called on the former president to tell McCarthy, “Sir, you do not have the votes and it’s time to withdraw.’”

Earlier Wednesday, Trump had done the opposite, urging Republicans to vote for McCarthy. “Close the deal, take the victory,” he wrote on his social media site, using all capital letters. “Do not turn a great triumph into a giant & embarrassing defeat.”

As the spectacle dragged on, McCarthy’s backers implored the holdouts to fall in line for the California Republican.

“I do think members on both sides of this are getting a lot of pressure now,” said Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla. “So I think the message from home is, ‘Hey, sort this stuff out.’”

The standoff over McCarthy has been building since Republicans won the House majority in the midterm elections, eager to end the past two years of Democratic control of Washington. The conservative Freedom Caucus led the opposition to McCarthy, believing he’s neither conservative enough nor tough enough to battle Democrats.

To win support, McCarthy has already agreed to many of the demands of Freedom Caucus members, who have been agitating for rules changes and other concessions that give rank-and-file members more influence.

And a McCarthy-aligned campaign group, the Conservative Leadership Fund, offered another concession, saying it would no longer spend money on elections “in any open-seat primaries in safe Republican districts.” The far-right lawmakers complained their preferred candidates for the House were being treated unfairly as the campaign fund put its resources elsewhere.

But those opposing McCarthy do not all have the same complaints, and he may never be able to win some over.

“I’m ready to vote all night, all week, all month and never for that person,” said Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla.

Such staunch opposition carried echoes of McCarthy’s earlier bid for the job, when he dropped out of the speaker’s race in 2015 because he could not win over conservatives.

Democrats enthusiastically nominated and renominated their House leader, Jeffries, on all six ballots for speaker over the two days. He repeatedly won the most votes overall, 212.

If McCarthy could win 213 votes, and then persuade the remaining naysayers to simply vote present, he would be able to lower the threshold required under the rules to have the majority.

It’s a strategy former House speakers, including outgoing Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Republican Boehner, had used when they confronted opposition, winning with fewer than 218 votes.

One Republican, Rep. Victoria Spartz of Indiana, voted present on Wednesday’s rounds, but it only ended up lowering McCarthy’s total.

___

AP writers Mary Clare Jalonick and Kevin Freking contributed reporting.

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FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — Heading into a tough election year, Gov. Andy Beshear asserted Wednesday evening that Kentucky’s future is “brighter than it has ever been” while touting a record of economic development and resilience to make his case.

The Democratic governor, delivering his fourth annual State of the Commonwealth address, cited record economic gains during his tenure and hailed the state’s ability to overcome the tragedies of tornadoes, flooding and a global pandemic that repeatedly turned his job into crisis management.

Beshear confronted the headwinds of Republican supermajorities in the legislature, urging lawmakers to pump more money into education, raise pay for public school teachers and achieve his goal of universal access to pre-kindergarten learning.

The governor used the statewide television address, on the second day of this year’s legislative session, to urge lawmakers to legalize access to medical cannabis. He already took executive action to allow Kentuckians with certain debilitating conditions to legally possess medical marijuana, provided the cannabis is purchased legally in other states.

But he said legislative action is still needed.

“Treating people right … dictates that this session and that this General Assembly finally legalize medical cannabis,” the governor said.

Beshear, whose term has been marked by policy disputes with lawmakers, also called for additional funding and other changes to shore up the state’s troubled juvenile justice system.

The governor, fresh off a morning appearance with President Joe Biden to mark the promised makeover of a dilapidated Ohio River bridge linking Kentucky and Cincinnati, punctuated his remarks by citing Scripture. He also called on state leaders to put aside partisan differences to pursue common goals in moving the Bluegrass State forward.

“As Kentuckians, we share more than divides us,” Beshear said. “We share the values of faith, of family and of community. And if we double down right now, if we lead with our values, and we push politics aside, there is nothing that we cannot achieve. Our future is brighter than it has ever been.”

The speech comes as Beshear prepares for a tough reelection campaign in a state that continues to trend toward Republicans. The governor has remained popular while leading the state through the series of tragedies but has drawn a crowded field of GOP candidates eager to unseat him.

Beshear’s efforts to stave off that GOP momentum is one reason the Kentucky governor’s race in 2023 will be closely watched nationally, coming the year before the next presidential election.

In his speech, the governor harkened back to the state’s tragedies that overshadowed his term — the COVID-19 pandemic, tornadoes that tore through parts of western Kentucky and floodwaters that inundated portions of eastern Kentucky.

“In the face of some of the greatest challenges imaginable, time and time again Kentuckians have shown up for one another,” Beshear said. “Scripture tells us that we are to love our neighbors as ourselves. And that’s exactly what folks across the commonwealth have been doing.”

The governor touted unprecedented economic growth over the past two years, saying it provides the “promise of a better Kentucky.” He said the legislature can continue the momentum by making additional investments in education and other priorities.

“This General Assembly has the opportunity to make great progress on each of these issues we’ve discussed tonight, and you have the funding to do it,” Beshear said. “If we can just find our way to do what is right for the people of Kentucky, then we will be the generation that changes everything for the better — the generation that ushers in a new era of prosperity.”

Afterward, Republican House Speaker David Osborne sounded reluctant to reopen the state’s budget to make sweeping changes during this year’s legislative session.

“I think it’s unlikely we’re going to make wholesale changes in any budget document,” Osborne said during an interview on Kentucky Educational Television.

The speaker said the current budget made crucial investments while providing lawmakers the flexibility to reduce the state’s individual income tax rate. Lawmakers are considering a measure aimed at cutting the income tax rate by another half-percentage point to 4%, effective Jan. 1, 2024.

The budget the GOP-led legislature passed last year poured money into teacher pensions and infrastructure and increased the state’s main funding formula for K-12 schools. Lawmakers declined last year to fund pre-K for every 4-year-old in Kentucky. And they left it up to school districts to decide whether to use additional state funding to provide higher pay to teachers and other school staff. Most districts awarded pay raises, Republicans say.

Osborne signaled Wednesday evening that shoring up the state’s juvenile justice network could be an issue where lawmakers find common ground with the governor. Beshear announced a series of changes late last year that were aimed at bring security problems under control.

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BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — After much anticipation, Louisiana’s U.S. Sen. John Kennedy told supporters he will not run for governor in October.

Kennedy, a Republican, had long indicated an interest in running for governor, but he made it official Wednesday afternoon, in an email to supporters, that he will not seek the position. Kennedy, who has mostly provided a safe Senate vote for Republicans and been a strong supporter of former President Donald Trump, easily won reelection to Congress November, fending off 12 challengers and securing himself a second six-year term.

“I have looked hard into my heart and decided to remain in the Senate and not to run for Governor,” Kennedy said in the email to supporters. “Senator and Governor are very different jobs.”

Kennedy added, “At this juncture, I just think I can help my state and my country more in the Senate.”

Louisiana’s current Gov. John Bel Edwards, a Democrat, is term-limited, making him unable to run this year. That opens a huge opportunity for Republicans hoping to capture the state’s top government post. But with the election about nine months away, only one person, Attorney General Jeff Landry, has officially launched a gubernatorial bid.

Similar to Kennedy, in November, the state’s other U.S. Senator— Bill Cassidy— announced he would not launch a gubernatorial bid, opting to focus on his role in Congress.

“For the last several years, I have been working on specific legislation that is critical for the future of our state and country. I don’t know if these will pass, but I know they will not pass if I decide to run for another office,” Cassidy, who is in the midst of his second six-year term in Senate, said in a statement. “I have chosen to remain focused on the job I was sent here to do and to see these efforts through.”

With the two GOP senators deciding not to enter the gubernatorial race, all eyes are on other possible candidates.

Louisiana State Treasurer John Schroder, Republican, said in December that should Kennedy not choose to run, he would plan “to announce and pursue the title of Governor in 2023.”

Lt. Gov. Billy Nungesser confirmed to reporters he plans on making an announcement on possible gubernatorial plans in early January. Additionally, U.S. Rep. Garret Graves and state Sen. Sharon Hewitt have indicated they are considering the contest for the state’s highest position.

Landry, the only candidate thus far, is a conservative Republican and staunch supporter of Trump. Landry has already received an early endorsement from the Louisiana Republican Party — an announcement that sparked outrage from potential candidates who have yet to officially throw their hats into the ring.

It remains unclear who will emerge as a Democratic candidate. However, during Gov. Edwards’ monthly radio call-in show, in November, the Democrat was asked what he thought about Shawn Wilson — the secretary of the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development — as a possible Democratic gubernatorial candidate.

“I have tremendous respect for him and his ability,” Edwards said. However, Edwards added that he does not know whether running for governor is something Wilson “fully intends to do or not.”

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McCarthy is under growing pressure from restless Republicans, and Democrats, to find the votes he needs or step aside, so the House can open fully and get on with the business of governing. His right-flank detractors appear intent on waiting him out, as long as it takes.

“No deal yet,” McCarthy said late Wednesday before the House abruptly adjourned. “But a lot of progress.”

In fact, McCarthy saw his support slipping to 201, as one fellow Republican switched to vote simply present.

“I think people need to work a little more,” McCarthy said Wednesday as they prepared to adjourn for the night. “I don’t think a vote tonight would make any difference. But a vote in the future could.”

When the House resumes at noon Thursday it could be a long day. The new Republican majority was not expected to be in session on Friday, which is the anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. A prolonged and divisive speaker’s fight would almost certainly underscore the fragility of American democracy after the attempted insurrection two years ago.

“All who serve in the House share a responsibility to bring dignity to this body,” California Democrat Nancy Pelosi, the former speaker, said in a tweet.

Pelosi also said the Republicans’ “cavalier attitude in electing a Speaker is frivolous, disrespectful and unworthy of this institution. We must open the House and proceed with the People’s work.”

Some Republicans appear to be growing uneasy with the way House Republicans have taken charge after the midterm election only to see the chamber upended over the speaker’s race in their first days in the new majority.

Colorado Republican Ken Buck voted for McCarthy but said Wednesday that he told him “he needs to figure out how to make a deal to move forward” or eventually step aside for someone else.

McCarthy has vowed to fight to the finish for the speaker’s job in a battle that had thrown the new majority into tumult for the first days of the new Congress.

The right-flank conservatives, led by the Freedom Caucus and aligned with former President Donald Trump, appeared emboldened by the standoff — even though Trump publicly backed McCarthy,

The disorganized start to the new Congress pointed to difficulties ahead with Republicans now in control of the House, much the way that some past Republican speakers, including John Boehner, had trouble leading a rebellious right flank. The result: government shutdowns, standoffs and Boehner’s early retirement.

A new generation of conservative Republicans, many aligned with Trump’s Make America Great Again agenda, want to upend business as usual in Washington, and were committed to stopping McCarthy’s rise without concessions to their priorities.

But even Trump’s strongest supporters disagreed on this issue. Colorado Republican Lauren Boebert, who nominated Donalds the second time, called on the former president to tell McCarthy, “Sir, you do not have the votes and it’s time to withdraw.’”

By McCarthy’s own calculation, he needs to flip about a dozen Republicans who have so far withheld their backing as he presses on for the job he has long wanted.

To win support, McCarthy has already agreed to many of the demands of Freedom Caucus members, who have been agitating for rules changes and other concessions that give rank-and-file members more influence.

Mostly, the holdouts led by the Freedom Caucus are seeking ways to shrink the power of the speaker’s office and give rank-and-file lawmakers more influence in the legislative process — with seats on key committees and the ability to draft and amend bills in a more free-for-all process. McCarthy conceded to some changes in a Rules package released over New Years weekend, but for some it didn’t go far enough.

“I am open to whatever will give me the power to defend my constituents against this godforsaken city,” said Texas Republican Chip Roy, a leader of the conservative group, told reporters after leaving a lengthy meeting late Wednesday.

And a McCarthy-aligned campaign group, the Conservative Leadership Fund, offered another concession, saying it would no longer spend money on elections “in any open-seat primaries in safe Republican districts.” The far-right lawmakers have complained that their preferred candidates for the House were being treated unfairly as the campaign fund put its resources elsewhere.

Pennsylvania Republican Scott Perry, the chairman of the Freedom Caucus, said the latest round of talks was “productive.”

But those opposing McCarthy do not all have the same complaints, and he may never be able to win over some of them. A small core group of Republicans appear unwilling to ever vote for McCarthy.

“I’m ready to vote all night, all week, all month and never for that person,” said Florida Republican Matt Gaetz.

Such staunch opposition carried echoes of McCarthy’s earlier bid for the job, when he dropped out of the speaker’s race in 2015 because he could not win over conservatives.

“We have no exit strategy,” South Carolina Republican Ralph Norman said.

“There’s nothing he can give me or any of our members that’s going to be a magic pill,” Norman said. “We’re here to vet a speaker. Vet the person third in line for the presidency and that’s a good thing.”

Not since 1923 had a speaker’s election gone to multiple ballots. The longest fight for the gavel started in late 1855 and dragged on for two months, with 133 ballots, during debates over slavery in the run-up to the Civil War.

Democrats enthusiastically nominated and renominated their House leader, Hakeem Jeffries, on all six ballots for speaker over the first two days. He repeatedly won the most votes overall, 212.

If McCarthy could win 213 votes, and then persuade the remaining naysayers to simply vote present, he would be able to lower the threshold required under the rules to have the majority.

It’s a strategy former House speakers, including Pelosi and Boehner, had used when they confronted opposition, winning with fewer than 218 votes.

One Republican, Victoria Spartz of Indiana, voted present on Wednesday’s rounds, but it only ended up lowering McCarthy’s total.

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WASHINGTON (AP) — New Hampshire Democrats on Thursday asked the national party not to “punish” them while overhauling its 2024 presidential primary calendar, arguing that implementing the proposed shakeup may amount to a “poison pill” against their state’s traditional role as among the first to vote.

In a letter to the Democratic National Committee’s rulemaking arm, New Hampshire Democratic Party Chairman Ray Buckley noted that state law mandates that New Hampshire hold the nation’s first presidential primary. He said changing it would require the support of Republican Gov. Chris Sununu and GOP members of the state Legislature, who oppose doing so.

“The DNC has handed New Hampshire Republicans a salient political attack to use against both state and national Democrats,” Buckley wrote. “This is an unfortunate, reckless, and self-inflicted blow.”

A DNC rulemaking committee voted last month to remove Iowa’s caucus as the leadoff of the presidential nominating calendar it has held since 1972 and replace it with South Carolina’s primary on Feb. 3, starting in 2024. Nevada and New Hampshire would go next, three days later, followed by Georgia the following week and then Michigan the week after that. Much of the rest of the country would subsequently vote on Super Tuesday.

President Joe Biden has championed a reordered primary calendar to better reflect the party’s deeply diverse electorate — especially the steadfast support of Black voters, who are prominent in South Carolina. The proposed changes also follow a technical meltdown that marred the results of Iowa’s 2020 caucus. They are set to be approved by the full DNC at a meeting in Philadelphia next month.

The new order may be moot for the next presidential cycle since Biden has said he intends to seek reelection, meaning his party will have little appetite for building out a robust 2024 primary calendar that could allow for challenges from other Democratic candidates. Still, what the national party decides for 2024 could influence primaries in 2028 and beyond, and Buckley’s letter lays bare how not all states are supportive of sweeping changes.

New Hampshire Democrats say that their state has held the nation’s first presidential primary for more than a century and that Iowa only preceded it because of its caucus format. Some have vowed to simply hold the New Hampshire primary first regardless of the calendar set by the national party, but the rules committee proposal says states doing so could face sanctions.

Sununu also wrote his own, separate letter on Thursday blasting South Carolina opening presidential primary voting as “absurd” and saying that “the power brokers in the Democrat party in Washington have made it clear that they believe New Hampshire’s time is up.”

“But I have a message for them and President Biden — you can try to come and take it — but that is Never. Going. To. Happen,” the governor wrote. Sununu added that state officials “across party lines stand in unison” on ensuring that New Hampshire holds the first presidential primary next year.

In the past, states attempting to jump ahead have risked losing delegates to the national party convention, discouraging presidential candidates from spending time campaigning in them. Buckley’s letter decried the “DNC’s threat to punish New Hampshire if it complies with state law.”

The state Democratic Party chairman wrote that any effort by the party or the Biden campaign to “withhold resources from the state until after the primary” would “gravely harm our efforts to build a general election coordinated campaign to reelect the president, elect Democrats up and down the ticket, and give Republicans the chance to out-organize our party in a state that has continued to trend blue.”

The DNC rules committee has also asked states now set to be among the first five voting in its primary to show progress toward expanding access to the ballot box through efforts like easing early voting rules. Buckley said New Hampshire Republicans have also opposed doing that, and called it “another area where the DNC’s requirements serve as nothing more than a seemingly deliberate poison pill for New Hampshire’s primary.”

“We ask that this committee not punish New Hampshire Democrats and recognize the Granite State’s first-in-the-nation primary in 2024,” he wrote.

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LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow, a member of the Democratic leadership, announced Thursday that she will not run for a fifth term in 2024, a surprise decision that opens up a seat in the key battleground state.

The news shocked many Democrats in the state because the 72-year-old Stabenow had not previously indicated that she would not seek reelection. Stabenow’s impending retirement turns Michigan’s next Senate race into one of the most competitive in the country as Democrats try to preserve their slim majority.

“Inspired by a new generation of leaders, I have decided to pass the torch in the U.S. Senate. I am announcing today that I will not seek reelection and will leave the U.S. Senate at the end of my term on January 3, 2025,” Stabenow said in a statement.

Democrats will face a test to find a candidate with Stabenow’s broad support. On the GOP side, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which works to elect Republicans, said in a statement after Stabenow’s announcement that it would “aggressively target this seat in 2024.”

While the current political climate in Michigan favors Democrats following a midterm election where they flipped the state House and Senate, the state is still expected to be one of the nation’s premier battlegrounds in the 2024 presidential election. Only one Michigan Republican has held a seat in the Senate in the past 40 years.

Among the Democrats whose names began circulating after Stabenow’s announcement are Pete Buttigieg, the federal transportation secretary who ran for president in 2020 and moved from Indiana to northern Michigan last year to be closer to his husband’s family; Elissa Slotkin, a congresswoman first elected in 2018 and coming off a decisive victory in November in one of the country’s most competitive House districts; and state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, who has seen her profile rise since going viral with a speech denouncing Republicans over “grooming” accusations.

Buttigieg said in a statement that he was “fully focused” on his Cabinet post and was “not seeking any other job.”

Stabenow joined Congress in 1996 after serving in the Michigan Legislature. In 2000, she made history by becoming the first woman to be elected senator in Michigan, defeating a Republican incumbent. She turned back GOP challenges in 2006 and 2012 and defeated Republican John James by 6.5 percentage points in her last election in 2018. James was elected to the House in November.

Stabenow is the longest-serving member of the state’s congressional delegation. She is chair of the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee, making her the No. 3 ranking party leader, and heads the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee.

Stabenow most recently has been involved in bipartisan legislation aimed at increasing oversight of cryptocurrencies. She has also led efforts to expand and increase funding for mental health care both nationally and in Michigan.

Praise for Stabenow began pouring in after her retirement announcement.

Democratic Gary Peters, the state’s junior senator who has served with Stabenow since 2015, said she would leave a legacy “as a champion for children, women and families, workers, manufacturing and our auto industry, mental health care and the Great Lakes.”

Buttigieg said Stabenow was “a force in the Senate” while McMorrow called her a “trailblazer.”

“No one has been more instrumental in building the infrastructure of the Michigan Democratic Party to this historic moment we’re in today,” McMorrow said.

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Nevada’s most populous county has provided the U.S. Justice Department special counsel with correspondence that shows lawyers for then-President Donald Trump raising concerns about the integrity of the 2020 voting process that were later deemed baseless, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.

Trump’s allies also demanded information about workers who were tasked with counting the votes, a request the county registrar sought to delay out of fear for the workers’ safety.

The correspondence was provided by Clark County to Jack Smith, the special counsel tasked with investigating efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the results of the election, in response to a subpoena seeking communications between Trump associates and county officials. Smith has issued similar subpoenas to officials in other battleground states, including Arizona, Michigan and Wisconsin, as prosecutors examine a pressure campaign aimed at keeping Trump in power.

The AP obtained the documents Tuesday through a public records request to Clark County, which includes Las Vegas and which — along with Nevada more generally — became a hotbed for conspiracy theories stemming from false claims of election fraud.

The records do not include any communication from Trump himself and do not appear to show attempts to coerce county officials, as Trump tried to do in Georgia. But they do show how Trump’s lawyers for weeks positioned themselves for post-election legal challenges in the county. They alleged that thousands of ballots had been improperly cast and, weeks before the election, filed a public records request aimed at scrutinizing the process by which mail-in and absentee ballots were counted.

Among the documents given to Smith is a letter from lawyers for the Trump campaign to the Clark County district attorney on Nov. 5, 2020, two days after Election Day. It asserted that 3,062 voters who moved from Nevada before the general election had cast ballots in the state and that the number was likely to grow by an additional six thousand.

The lawyers wrote that “lax procedures for authenticating voter identity” had called into question the legitimacy of the entire election in the state.

But the Nevada secretary of state’s office categorically dismissed that claim in a report the following April. The report said that many of the voters alleged by the Nevada Republican Party to have moved out of state or to another country just before the election had actually moved to cities and towns adjacent to military bases.

It also noted that there are numerous legitimate reasons for someone to request a change of postal address while retaining their original Nevada voter registration address.

In addition, a labor-intensive public records request from Trump lawyers, filed as county officials were gearing up for an Election Day less than two weeks away, sought pictures of voter signatures on envelopes that contained mail ballots. The Trump lawyers also wanted information about mail ballots cast in the election without being accompanied by a voter’s signature or that had signatures that didn’t match the one on file in the voter registration record.

Trump lawyers separately sought the names of voters who were part of Clark County’s counting board, as well as the political composition of the board for each shift. The county said it would provide that information — but for security reasons, not until after the election canvas deadline.

Much of the records released to the AP consisted of correspondence between Joe Gloria, at the time the county registrar of voters, and Jesse Law, who was one of six “fake electors” from the Nevada GOP who signed certificates falsely stating that Trump won the state in 2020.

The certificates were sent to Congress and the National Archives, where they ultimately were ignored. Law, who also was part of Trump’s 2020 operation, mainly asked for details of the vote-counting process in Clark County.

In an interview last month, just before he was to step down from the position, Gloria described the harassment he said he and his staff endured during the 2020 election. He said protesters stood 100 feet (about 30 meters) from his office door, some carrying weapons, as he and his staff counted ballots.

He received ominous emails and messages, some reading “We know where you live” and “We know where your family sleeps.”

Smith, a veteran war crimes prosecutor who once led the Justice Department section that prosecutes public corruption, was named special counsel in November to investigate attempts by Trump associates to undo the 2020 election results, as well as the retention of classified records at Trump’s Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago.

Within weeks of his appointment, the AP and other news organizations reported on subpoenas sent to local election officials in about a half-dozen battleground states disputed by Trump but won by Democrat Joe Biden.

The AP asked Clark County this week for the same records that were given to Smith. The county responded with a 35-page document consisting largely of correspondence between lawyers for the Trump campaign and Gloria, as well as public records requests and court documents.

The records do not include any correspondence from some of the more prominent names included in the subpoena, including former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, who aided Trump’s efforts to challenge the election results.

Smith also sent a subpoena to Nevada’s then-secretary of state’s office in November, requesting records of communication with a list of Trump-connected officials who spurred efforts to overturn the 2020 election. The office turned over just one document in their response — a Zoom invite between the office and several Nevada GOP fake electors who were not on Smith’s list.

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Stern, who reported from Reno, Nevada, is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms.

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State lawmakers around the country introduced thousands of bills to change the way elections are run after former President Donald Trump falsely blamed his 2020 loss on voter fraud. Hundreds became law.

Even with proponents of Trump’s election lies roundly defeated during this year’s midterms, advocates on both sides of the voting debate are bracing for another round of election-related legislation. Republicans are eager to tighten election rules further while Democrats, who took control of two additional statehouses, will seek to make it easier to cast a ballot.

Minnesota’s newly reelected Democratic secretary of state, Steve Simon, said he had spoken to several secretaries of state who are eager to push for changes in voting. Losses by election-denier candidates in top races have emboldened some Democrats to champion expansions of voting rights.

“Voters spoke loudly and clearly about what they wanted and didn’t want, both in regards to this office and all these other issues,” said Simon, who defeated a Republican challenger who parroted some of Trump’s lies about the 2020 election.

Democrats won majorities in both houses of the Minnesota Legislature in November, giving Simon a good shot at enacting changes. He expects to urge lawmakers to adopt automatic voter registration and allow high school students to pre-register.

States routinely make adjustments in their voting laws — some subtle, some dramatic. But experts have never seen an explosion of legislation like that which followed the 2020 presidential election, when more than 3,600 election bills were introduced, according to the Voting Rights Lab, which tracks the legislation.

Liz Avore, senior adviser to the group, said 22 states in the last couple of years expanded access to the ballot, 10 created new restrictions and five expanded access in some ways while creating new barriers in others. This, she said, has created a divide in the U.S. in which “your ZIP code determines your access to our democracy.”

That divide seems likely to grow next year. Legislatures won’t convene until January at the earliest, so it’s unclear how many bills are being drafted and on which subjects. But Texas, where the Legislature meets only once every two years and lawmakers can “pre-file” drafts of legislation for the upcoming session, offers a preview.

The Associated Press has identified nearly 100 election-related legislative proposals already filed in the state, both to increase access to the ballot box and to further restrict it. This includes one that would allow the state’s top lawyer to assign a prosecutor focused on election crimes, testing the boundaries of a court ruling earlier this year that said the attorney general did not have the authority to prosecute election crimes.

Another would assign a group of peace officers to serve as election marshals who investigate claims of election-related missteps. That would follow the lead of Florida, where officers in a special unit assigned to elections have already made a handful of arrests — including of people who mistakenly thought they were eligible to vote under a 2018 constitutional amendment restoring voting rights to some felons. Critics have labeled the unit a political tool of the governor.

Matt Simpson, a senior attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, said current election legislation proposed in the state, such as increasing criminal penalties for election crimes and creating election marshals, is “extreme” and “very intimidating” for voters. He said these approaches are primarily political and don’t solve actual voting-related issues, such as high rejection rates of mail ballots and ballot applications due to widespread confusion on the identification numbers necessary.

“It is certainly the case that Texas elections do not have widespread fraud,” Simpson said. “These bills, these concerns that are raised, are solutions in search of a problem.”

The reliability of Texas’ elections was underscored by the release earlier this month of an audit by the secretary of state’s office. The 359-page audit of the 2020 election in the state’s two largest Democratic counties and two largest Republican ones found some “irregularities,” but they were largely related to holding an election during a pandemic.

“In most cases, the audit found that the counties followed their procedures and clearly documented their activities,” the audit says.

Ohio is another Republican-controlled state where lawmakers continue to push for restrictions.

The state is likely to draw national attention next year after Republicans indicated they might try again to place on the May ballot a measure requiring a 60% majority for any future constitutional amendments to pass. That provision could limit the ability of Ohio voters to rein in GOP gerrymandering or otherwise counter the majority-Republican Legislature, such as by codifying the right to an abortion.

Republicans failed to muster enough votes during December’s lame-duck session to place the higher threshold for passing amendments on the ballot, but they did pass a sweeping election law overhaul. The bill adds a photo ID requirement for voters and provides them for free, codifies a directive requiring one ballot drop box per county and eliminates early voting on the Monday before Election Day — county officials had said it interfered with their final preparations. The legislation also shrinks the window for receiving mail-in ballots after the election from 10 days to four.

Republican state Sen. Theresa Gavarone said taking steps to tighten access to the voting booth and speed vote counting are aimed at improving the “perception, confidence and integrity” in elections.

“Folks, perception matters,” Gavarone said. “Whether you want to believe it or not, the goal should not just be to secure our elections, but it’s imperative that we give people doubting the results of our elections reason to participate in them.”

Voting rights advocates were outraged.

“This legislation will make voting unnecessarily harder for seniors, students, rural Ohioans, active-duty military and other eligible Ohioans,” said Jen Miller, executive director of the League of Women Voters Ohio.

The office of Republican Gov. Mike DeWine said he was reviewing the legislation.

Democrats are readying their own pushes, especially in two states where they won control of the legislatures and retained the governorship — Michigan and Minnesota.

Michigan voters not only gave Democrats control of the state Legislature, they also passed Proposal 2, a sweeping ballot initiative that expanded early and mail voting. Democrats already are preparing to strengthen the measure in the legislative session.

“There will need to be quite a bit of implementation legislation next term, and I look forward to working with the Legislature and the governor’s office to enact this,” Ingham County Clerk Barb Byrum, a Democrat, said in an interview.

Jake Rollow, a spokesman for the Michigan Department of State, said Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson will likely ask lawmakers to allocate $100 million annually for local election offices and propose new measures against circulating election misinformation. A Democratic state lawmaker also proposed imposing penalties for people who pressure election workers, a key cause of Democrats in state legislatures after conspiracy theorists targeted voting officials after the 2020 presidential election.

In Minnesota, Simon said he also wants to increase penalties against threatening or interfering with election workers. He said he’ll push a range of other reforms, including pre-registering high schoolers so they can quickly join the voting rolls upon turning 18. Younger voters lean Democratic, but Simon said he’s not trying to promote his party.

He said he merely wants to make the electorate more reflective of the population, a goal he also pushed when the statehouse was split between Republicans and Democrats.

“These are reforms that will benefit everyone,” he said.

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Associated Press writers Joey Cappelletti in Lansing, Michigan, and Julie Carr Smyth in Columbus, Ohio, contributed to this report.

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