Our First-Ever House Speaker Draft 01:03:46

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There is a world where like, I don't know, Kevin McCarthy becomes speaker again. I mean, that's likelier than several other people on this list. Probably likelier than, say, Dan Muser becoming speaker. Not as likely as Britney Spears, though.

Hello and welcome to the FiveThirtyEight Politics Podcast. I'm Galen Druk. The House of Representatives has now officially been without a permanent speaker for 20 days. Two nominations for the position have fallen apart, Steve Scalise and Jim Jordan, and Republicans are, as of Monday morning, back at square one.

Republicans interested in the speakership had until Sunday night to make their intentions clear and nine candidates stepped forward. The current plan is that House Republicans will hold a candidate forum Monday night and another leadership election on Tuesday. Whether the next nominee can get a majority on the House floor, 217 votes if all lawmakers are in attendance, remains to be seen.

This is, of course, all happening as the war in Israel and Gaza continues to play out, and President Biden has asked for a $106 billion package to aid Ukraine and Israel and address U.S. border security. Given the depth of the candidate field and the degree of uncertainty surrounding what happens next, we have been left with no other option than to hold our first ever House Speaker Draft.

Who is most likely to get the job, if anyone? Maybe fair to ask that at this point. And here with me to participate is senior elections analyst Jeffrey Skelly. Hello, Jeff. Good morning, Galen. This is a fun one. It is. It is. Also here with us is politics reporter Leah Escarinam. Welcome, Leah. Thank you. And welcome.

also here to draft a team for next house speaker is Atlanta Journal-Constitution Washington correspondent Tia Mitchell. Welcome back to the pod, Tia. Thanks for having me back. It's great to have you. I hope you're excited to draft a team. We'll see. There are nine candidates running. I'm curious to hear if you think those are actually the nine likeliest people to get the job. I'll

I'll also say that later in the show, President of Eurasia Group Ian Bremmer is going to be joining to talk about the information environment surrounding the war in Israel and Gaza. Basically, from the initial Hamas attacks, it has often been hard to get a sense of what is happening on the ground. There have been conflicting reports, misinformation, and sometimes straight-up deception. So to what extent is this social media's fault, the fog of war, shoddy reporting? We're going to talk all about it.

But let's begin with our speaker draft. As of the time of this recording, the lawmakers running for the job are Jack Bergman of Michigan, Byron Donalds from Florida, Tom Emmer from Minnesota, Kevin Hearn from Oklahoma, Mike Johnson from Louisiana, Dan Muser from Pennsylvania, Gary Palmer from Alabama, Austin Scott from Georgia, and Pete Sessions from Texas. And if you're saying, wow, I've never heard some of those names before, let me assure you, listener, you're not alone.

I'll also say that as history has shown, interest in the job and even support from a majority of the caucus does not a speakership make. So Tia, Leah, Jeff, feel free to be imaginative here.

And according to random.org, that is the order we are going in. First Tia, then Leah, then Jeff. And as always, we're going to make this a snake draft. So just to kick things off, let us know a little bit of information about the person, particularly if someone we've never heard of before, and why you think they're on track for the job. So, Tia?

Take it away. I'm going to go with my Georgia representative, Austin Scott. Now, I know a lot of people hadn't heard of him until he ran for speaker initially back on October 13th, which seems like a lifetime ago now. People

call him a backbencher. I would never call him a backbencher. He represents South Georgia, Tifton. If you've ever driven down 75 South from Georgia going to Florida, Tifton's a big rest stop area. Are you saying he's from the Florida-Georgia line? Not quite, but close enough. Close enough. So we'll go with that. And pecan country. But

I am giving him my first draft pick because of all the people you mentioned. Austin Scott already ran for speaker and got 81 votes out of roughly 200 Republicans. So he's almost halfway there. No one else in the field can say that. Let's go, Austin Scott.

Tia, that's a pretty bold pick. Are you just biased towards Georgia? I mean, I'm just looking at the betting markets right now. He's not even on Smarkets, if you're interested in Smarkets. He's not even ranking on the main dashboard. Let me see. Polymarket, Austin, Scott, I don't...

I don't see him. So the serious political analysis is he doesn't have much of a chance because, yes, he did kind of have that spoiler candidacy as an alternate to Jim Jordan, knowing that so many House Republicans hated Jim Jordan and didn't want him to become speaker. So that's how he got 81 votes on October 13th. But now that there are so many Republican candidates,

who have higher profiles, have leadership roles. I don't think he's going to last long in the balloting. But yes, my draft pick today is because I'm giving that Georgia love.

All right, so we're already just diving right into sort of sending messages with this draft. All right, okay, interesting. Leah, who are you picking? Well, now I'm kind of thrown off because I was going to go for like the easy one. And now I feel inspired to kind of go more with my gut and take a chance.

So, and Jeff's going to win anyway, right? Like he has like a huge spreadsheet. So, you know, what are we going to do? So I'm actually going to go with Pete Sessions.

Texas Republican. It's 2014 again. Sorry. That's my take on Pete Sessions. Sorry. Sorry. That's a good take. So why Pete Sessions? Well, one, I sometimes forget that he's back in Congress after losing in 2018. And I saw his name on the list and was like, oh, right. He's still here. But mostly because he was...

chair of the NRCC in 2010, the year Republicans flipped something like 60-plus seats or netted something like 60-plus seats as chairman of the NRCC or kind of one of the top fundraisers in the Republican Party, which is one of the big gaps that McCarthy has left.

Importantly, he did lose in 2018 to Colin Allred, Texas Democrat, now running for Senate. And then he came back and he ran again in 2020. And I think if you are running for Speaker right now, you got to be okay with rejection and then coming back strong. Wow. Wow. Okay. I think personality-wise, Pete Sessions. Okay. Okay.

These are some really hipster picks so far. I think I'm not really going to go hard challenging them until Jeff goes and I think presents what most people would agree are the likeliest outcomes. So, Jeff, go ahead and we'll see where you take this conversation.

Yeah, I guess sort of in the joke here or whatever, I'll be the straight man or whatever in the setup. Hey, I'm not joking about Pete Sessions, okay? He is not a joke. He is a member of the Republican Party delegation in Texas. Yeah, and you know, in 2014, I could have seen him becoming speaker. Also, if Texas sticks together, if the Texas Republicans stick together, that's a huge voting block. Definitely.

This is true. Good point. This is very true. Okay. I will go ahead and pick, I think, who's the most likely person. Now, I don't know if I could put a probability on it, but that would be Tom Emmer, who is a representative from Minnesota. He is the current majority whip. So he is the third-ranking Republican when there's a speaker. Right now, he's the second-ranking Republican, I guess, because there's not technically a speaker with Republicans in the majority. And so Emmer –

He's been in Congress for a bit. I think this is his fifth term, and he's got McCarthy's endorsement already. Now, I think on the one hand, the fact that Kevin McCarthy got turned out of office would sort of suggest that that's not –

some sort of certainty. But at the same time, McCarthy, at the end of the day, had the support for most of the caucus to remain speaker. It took eight Republicans who voted against him, along with all Democrats, to actually force him out.

So I think that endorsement is notable. I will say a drawback for Emmer is that former President Trump is opposed to him. And so I think you may hear more noise about that. Now, granted, Jim Jordan had Trump's endorsement, and obviously he is not speaker right now. So how much weight Trump has in this particular fight is, I think, maybe more limited than we're used to. But I think Emmer, because of his leadership position, because McCarthy's backing Trump,

He raises a decent amount of money, and that's not an idle consideration with the speakership. I think he's probably the favorite. And so I'm going to take him with the third pick here. I think you're right, Jeff. I think Emmer can probably get to a majority. I

I don't know if Emmer can avoid the same thing that Kevin McCarthy faced and that Steve Scalise faced, which is not being able to get to 217 because the hardliners, the closest to Trump are the ones who are most thirsty, quite frankly, for Trump's approval. I don't know if they'll ever get behind Emmer, especially since Trump has said what he said, which means that

Emmer can't become speaker. I also think, I think it's really hard for people in traditional leadership in the Republican Party and in the House to find a lane that McCarthy has not already occupied and already shown the limits of. But what do you think about this effort to now just vote for anybody who gets a majority in the caucus and who goes to the floor? Like, at a certain point,

Is it going to become less of a concern who Trump does or doesn't want, who is the most conservative? Because, yeah, he's not the most conservative by far of the picks. You know, I think according to DW nominate scores, he is third least conservative of the nine running. He's in a Trump plus 18 district, which is the least Trumpy district of any of the candidates. But he seems to be a well-liked person within amongst House Republicans. And

And at a certain point, they got to say, we need someone to fill the role. Let's just go with the person who has the most support right now. Do you not see that happening? Or am I just being a Pollyanna? I think there are certain hardliners in the House who do want to get back to work and they want a speaker, but not at the expense of a speaker that they don't like.

And so I think there are some House Republicans, the question is how many, but are there some House Republicans who are willing to continue to vote against these various candidates who have the majority because they don't want to let someone in who does not fit their ideals for what a speaker should be? And if they continue dug in, the Matt Gaetz's of the world.

We'll continue to cycle through these candidates that are popular. Emmer is popular. Emmer will have all these pledges from Austin Scott and others who say, if Emmer's the nominee, I will support him. But the pledges mean nothing to people like Matt Gaetz. And so the question really is, can Emmer get Matt Gaetz and people like Matt Gaetz?

Well, the Scottish teens tend to think so, the Scottish teens being the betting markets. According to PolyMarket, Tom Emmer has a 25% chance of becoming the next speaker. And according to Smarkets...

he has a 23% chance, which is the highest of any of the candidates currently running. Okay, Jeff, who's your next pick? Well, reflecting some of the comments made there in terms of, you know, might Emmer have trouble sort of on the farthest right flank of the party, my next pick, the fourth overall, is Kevin Hearn from Oklahoma.

Hearn is definitely more conservative, sort of more anti-establishment in terms of I think how he's viewed. I think the big thing for him is that he is chair of the Republican Study Committee. Now, the RSC used to be sort of the most conservative committee.

sort of ideological group within the Republican Party, but perhaps reflecting the shift in the GOP to the right overall. Now about four-fifths of the members of the entire House conference are in the Republican Study Committee. So he is chair of a group that makes up

the vast majority of Republicans in the House. He also did receive votes during the January speaker vote as an alternative to McCarthy at one point. He was looking to run during the initial sort of post-McCarthy vacuum, but he decided to not run since Scalise and Jim Jordan were running. You know, he might be too conservative for some members of the caucus, but he's not

I think, seen as conservative as someone like Jim Jordan. So he might actually be kind of a strong compromise candidate in the end for the party. So I think that's a good reason to think he's a decent bet. So he's my next pick. Really going with the Scottish teens in your picks. According to Polymarket, he's got a 20% chance, which is the second likeliest. Although, according to Smarket...

He only has an 11% chance and is fourth likeliest.

I'd like to make it clear I did not look at what the Scottish teens were saying because this is exactly the sort of setup where I would not really take those numbers with any salt. I mean, all right, sorry. I would take them with a lot of salt. You got to salt those a lot. You got to salt those Scottish teen numbers. Salt it as much as they salt their North Sea fish. I actually think...

Actually, I think at least with Emmer, like I think 25 percent is probably. Oh, no, no, no. That's fair. But that's like I mean, you're taking. But what I'm saying is that, oh, you're giving him a one in four shot and he's the highest ranking Republican running like brilliant. Well done. You know, like really powerful deduction there anyway. All right. But now we have to take this proposition from the other direction, which is to say that

So on one hand, there were holdouts against Steve Scalise, as Tia described. But on the other hand, there have been a set of moderates, 15 to 20, who have been holdouts when Jim Jordan ran. So why is Kevin Hearn not going to run into the same situation that Jim Jordan ran into? I've got one word. McGriddles. Oh my God, yeah, you didn't even give us the most important background biographical information on this guy. Yeah, so Hearn, uh...

Basically built an empire of McDonald's franchises before he got into Congress. Well, and he's been sending snacks to the members. Yeah, he's been sending McDonald's to other members. Like, he did that initially when he was feeling out running

for speaker. I think the big difference actually beyond the joking thing about McDonald's food is as a way of getting to people's hearts and stomachs is that Hearn just doesn't have the track record for controversy that someone like Jim Jordan does. And so even if Hearn is pretty conservative and maybe not that far away from Jordan on a measure like DW nominate,

Either in terms of how conservative he is or how anti-establishment he is. He's like pretty close to Jordan. A little more toward the center of the party on both scores, but close to Jordan. I think the fact that Jordan just has a lot of controversy attached to him is an important differentiator. And also for Jim Jordan, he suffered from not just being controversial and being far right

from a political standpoint, he suffered because he was the chosen candidate of Matt Gaetz and the crew. So some of it was literally just like, we're not going to let your candidate win because you stopped our people from winning. It was very literally a tit for tat in why Jim Jordan was blocked. I'm not saying every Republican felt this way, but that was

one of the undercurrents to why he couldn't get the votes on the House floor. So Hearn won't necessarily be that, although, again, if one or two people perceive that Hearn is Matt Gaetz's guy, and those one or two people right now hate Matt Gaetz's guts because he started this, in their opinion, he started this mess on October 3rd.

Are there five House Republicans who will vote for no candidates that they perceive as having Matt Gaetz's support? Possibly, and if so, those five will stop any candidate they perceive as Matt Gaetz's candidate. So if that becomes Hearn, then he, once again, won't be able to be speaker, not necessarily because of anything he stands for, but because of who stands behind him.

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All right, Leah, we are back at you. Who are you picking? I'm going to go with Patrick McHenry. Okay, point of clarification. Are you going with Patrick McHenry as actual permanent?

permanent speaker, or are you going with Patrick McHenry as empowered speaker pro tempore? So this is a draft for actual speaker. So for the purposes of this exercise, actual speaker. Thank you for clarifying. However, if you asked me in general, would I be a little bit more cautious? Yes, if we weren't, if we weren't, if the stakes weren't so high, but... Well, I want to be really clear here, Leah.

No one has picked no one. And that is an option. Like, in the draft, when I read off your teams at the end of this exercise, no one will be an option. I'm going to stick with this. And here's why. Here's why. I think that there is a high likelihood of McHenry...

getting expanded powers for a few months when none of the other names we mentioned today are selected for speaker before the government shuts down, when the government runs out of funding. And so I do think that at some point, if there isn't a speaker, that the only option will be to expand exponentially.

his power temporarily, which is a pill that I'd imagine some Democrats could swallow as well. So going with the principle of inertia slash momentum, one of those two, I think that once he basically acts as Speaker, it will be easier for him to win an actual vote as Speaker. So once he actually gets into that position and

Would maybe some of the Gates allies be like, this is fine. We don't have to go back to what happened a few months ago. Just kind of like, don't have to take any losses.

and move on and make him speaker. That said, I don't think he wants to be speaker. So like, you know that, but nobody who's speaker in the Republican Party has ever wanted to be speaker. They do it for a while and then they go write a book about how it was terrible. Oh, I think they wanted to be speaker. They just, you know. Kevin McCarthy very much wants to be speaker. Let's say Paul Ryan and John Boehner.

No, I think Boehner wanted to be Speaker. He just, you know, grew to hate it. Isn't that the sort of the way that you get the job, though? Like, you just, you play coy and you say, I don't, I don't want it. Only, only if, you know, my colleagues really insist what I sort of make. Do my American duty. Exactly. What I make the sacrifice is.

I'm sure in the back of Patrick, I mean, why go to Congress if you don't want power? Like, frankly, I mean, just live a normal, nice life and not engage with any of this crap, right? Like, yeah, no, you're I think that's a good case from from McHenry. I think it's I mean, that's I think the big caveat is like he this is what he says. But again, like everybody said, you're right. Everybody says that in politics. Everybody's not running for president until they're running for president.

So no, I think that like once the best way to get a job is to do the job and then you get it officially. So that's why I'm going with McHenry.

In Congress, in a local office near you, the best way to get a job is to do the job and then demand that you actually get paid for it and the title. I love it. So he is up there on the betting markets. I'm your official betting markets correspondent this morning. It's 15 to 20 percent in the markets. I think also it's just maybe also a factor of

people know who he is now and people have no idea who anyone else is. Yeah, just to clarify, just for listeners who don't know, he is currently the acting speaker pro tempore. So when McCarthy got ousted-

mccarthy had a list because of a post-911 rule that they implemented in case like for continuity of government's sake where mccarthy had a list of people who would become speaker if something happened to him and mchenry was first on that list and so mchenry is currently overseeing things in the house but in terms of how that's been interpreted in the house he has very limited power uh so

There is this option out there, though, of giving him more power, and maybe that could lead to him even becoming permanent speaker to Leah's point. All right, Tia, take it away. You got two picks, but first one for now. So two picks. The first pick, I'm going to go with another relatively long shot candidate, but one who I think could get attention. That's Florida Representative Byron Donalds.

He came in, he first went to the Florida legislature, that's when I first encountered him, riding the Tea Party wave. But he's a black Republican, but he's very aligned with like the MAGA Trump Republican wing of the party. And during those 15 rounds when people opposed Kevin McCarthy,

There were votes even then for Byron Donalds, not many, but there was talk about, you know, he could be the first black speaker of the house. I think Republicans would love to steal that from Hakeem Jeffries if they can. So that's been part of kind of the narrative, like, why don't we elevate Byron Donalds and show the nation that the Republican Party is a big tent? And look, our speaker is a black man. Now, of course, there were critics who said that's incorrect.

very tokenism of the Republican Party, but so be it. Byron Donalds is pretty likable. He's good in front of a camera. And I think some people do consider him kind of the census candidate because yes, he's very far right, very Trump aligned, but is not considered a flamethrower in the same way as some of the other hardliners are. So my draft pick is Byron Donalds.

Okay. For the record, according to the betting markets, Hakeem Jeffries ranks higher than Byron Donalds as the next possible speaker, which reminds me— This is why those things are meaningless. Because if you think Hakeem Jeffries is going to end up being speaker at the end of this, you're not really aware of how politics works. I'm sorry.

Hey, hold up. It's not happening. There's not going to be a coalition government or something. I think it could be a miscount. Somebody could just miscount. I could see it happening by accident.

But he would immediately have a motion to vacate. So I'm not saying Democrats wouldn't try some shenanigans if there were, you know, some absences, issues or whatever. And maybe like the Gates's of the world forced a speaker vote on the floor, even though the math wasn't mathing. But he wouldn't be speaker for long if that were to happen.

It's become a cliche over the past however many years, but the sort of veepification of American politics, that would truly be the most veep possible outcome ever.

ever. They get an accidental Democratic speaker with a Republican majority and then have to vacate the seat once again. I mean, truly, Veep could not write that. I mean, you guys are exactly right that it would, the miscount is the situation. But I think the problem is that there are some people out there who think that there's going to be some sort of coalitional thing where a few Republicans vote for Jeffries or something. No. And that's never going to happen. Never. Ever.

So I just wanted to kill that idea. Which is kind of why it's ridiculous that Republicans keep blaming Democrats like this is Democrats' fault for putting us in this position. You thought Democrats were going to vote for Kevin McCarthy for speaker? Like that would have never happened. This is not the fault of Democrats that they didn't support a Republican speaker, especially when that Republican speaker not only didn't necessarily try to curry favor with Democrats,

but towards the end had become kind of adversarial in the way he talked about Democrats. So, yeah, that's not going to happen.

And I forget which round it was, but one of the million rounds that McCarthy did have for a speaker vote, there was a miscount once from what I remember. So it's not like it couldn't happen. Well, there you go. Some Scottish teams could cash in in a big way if there ends up being a miscount and Hakeem Jeffries takes the speakership momentarily. But anyway, okay, Byron Donalds, who's your third pick?

I'm going to go with a non-House member, a long shot candidate. Stick with me here, guys. All right. Susan Cole. I could have sworn you were going to say Donald Trump, but now I'm even vastly more intrigued. Susan Cole is the House clerk. So for most of the rounds of the speaker vote, she's the lady who reads the names. And everyone talks about how congressmen

and cool and collected she is round after round, reading 433 names at this point. So, you know, she's just getting a lot of shine. There's been a lot of articles written about her. Even some people have jokingly referred to her as Madam Speaker because she does keep, you know, kind of, again, a very calm but tight grip on these speakership votes and

So again, she's the House clerk. It's a long shot. It's a no shot. I'm going to be honest. Tia, what are her politics? We don't know. She's anti-political. She's the clerk. No, I'm joking. But it's a joke. It's not serious. But I think the fact that there's so much attention on Susan Cole and her role in these speaker votes is

I think it's just worth giving her a shout out, and that's what I'm using my third pick for. I mean, she is the Republican choice for clerk. She is. I mean, that's how she ended up as clerk of the House, so...

I can't tell Tia if you're just throwing this draft. I don't. Do you believe in any of the candidates that you've picked? So the honest truth is, I don't think anybody can do it. I think the House Republicans are too fractured right now. Then why don't you pick no one? I said that no one was an option. Oh, I thought we were going to do that later. Like, well, if you give me a fourth round. Could have been your first pick.

Yeah, well, my honest first pick, then get rid of Austin Scott. Put no one in the top number one draft pick. No one. I don't think they can do it. There are a lot of emotions. Like when you're out in that hallway after they come out of these closed door meetings on Friday, literally there were lawmakers seething. I've talked to lawmakers before.

with tears in their eyes. There's just so much emotion and frustration as they keep going round after round, the animosity, the finger pointing, the literal shouting matches and cursing out of each other that is happening in these closed door meetings.

I don't think anyone can get to 217. That's my honest opinion. So Susan Cole has just as much of a chance as Emmer and Hearn at this point. I don't know whether or not to write Susan Cole or no one under your third round pick, but I'll just write Susan Cole slash no one. I'm down with that. Leah, we're back to you. Really getting into some...

some slim pickings here now that no one and Tom Emmer have both been chosen. Let's talk about what would have to happen for a coalition government, Jeff, watching your brain explode here. So it would have to be a Republican, right? It would have to be a moderate Republican who would have some Democratic support rather than a Democrat with some Republican support, right?

What Republican would Democrats be able to empower with the fewest political consequences and kind of the least, the smallest chance of giving credibility to the Republican Party at large? So somebody who is completely not representative of other Republicans, basically so that other Republicans can't run and be like, I'm a Democrat.

you know, Don Bacon Republican. So I'm actually not going to go with Don Bacon. I'm going to go with David Valadao of California.

A Republican who voted to impeach Trump and yet was reelected in a Biden district. California does have different elections than the rest of the country. They have top two. But he effectively managed to avoid a primary, which no other House Republican who voted to impeach Trump managed to pull off.

I think it's going to be incredibly difficult for Democrats to defeat him, considering Feldeo won in 2022 in a Biden district. I think the other kind of moderate Republicans in maybe New York, like if they were to empower somebody like Lawler, maybe he could lift up some of the other New York Republican freshmen, which could cost Democrats the majority since there are so many vulnerable Republicans

Republican freshman in New York, and it's going to be hard to dislodge Valadao anyway. So could Valadao potentially get some Democratic votes? Why not? So question, how many Republican votes does he get and how many Democratic votes does he get? I don't, that's not part of this game. I don't have to answer that.

I would say he would get like, I can see him getting, okay, so the 10, like there would be 10 Republicans who definitely would never vote for him, right? Only 10? Yeah, more than 10. At least 10. Marjorie Taylor Greene ain't voting for no coalition candidate. But is it, okay, so is it a coalition candidate if it's a, like is a coalition candidate by definition a Democrat? Yeah.

No. A coalition candidate is somebody who gets Democratic support and is therefore only speaker with Democratic support for the duration of their term as speaker and therefore has to make decisions and bring legislation to the floor and rely on Democratic votes. So the problem with giving this numbers is that it's not going to happen. So I'm not... So this is more a

You know, a thought exercise, a, you know, an alternate reality and a different kind of politics. If this were a state government instead of federal government, something like this could happen. But no, I don't have I don't have numbers. Numbers don't work for this.

the numbers don't work. Yeah, I mean, I think about it like when you think about a coalition candidate possibility, I think about the vote on the temporary government funding to avoid a shutdown that, you know, happened, you know,

preceded, quite frankly, Kevin McCarthy's ouster. And at the end of the day, there were more Democrats than Republicans who voted for that legislation to avoid a government shutdown. And I could see the same thing happening where if you get a candidate who can get Democrats to support them, even if they're a Republican, there would be Republicans who just revolt against that again on principle.

And then you're left with this coalition candidate who has more Democrats than Republicans supporting them. Also, though, don't Democrats want to keep Republicans in this situation? Like, we're suggesting that the main challenge to getting to a coalition government, you know, this sort of pretend coalition government that we say isn't going to happen, is that Republicans wouldn't support it. But—

But I kind of think Democrats wouldn't support it either because they're enjoying watching the Republican caucus squirm. And we've already seen damage done to the image of congressional Republicans in polling. You know, we've seen actually a significant drop in approval, even amongst Republicans, to the point where—

congressional Republicans are now underwater with Republican voters themselves, not voters writ large, which Congress, you know, you can bet on that. They'll always be underwater with Americans writ large. But specifically, Republicans in Congress are underwater with Republican voters. And I would think that Democrats are enjoying this. I mean, they'll say—

that this is awful, we need government in place, we need leadership, there's a war going on, there are multiple wars going on, but that politically they're satisfied. I mean, I think they'd go along with it if the deal included them having like co-committee power and all these other things that come with some sort of coalitional arrangement. But again, this is never going to happen. And I think if there was a world where Valadao was

Was this candidate. He wouldn't finish in the top two next time. You know, he only beat the other Republican by three points for the second spot in 2022 after voting to impeach Trump and was likely helped by the top two system in California because the only two impeachment votes on the Republican side who survived 2022 were

were Dan Newhouse and David Valdeo. And the thing that was unique about them is that they were in top two elections because of Washington State and California. So in a typical Republican primary, you're dead. So presumably, if someone voted for this, they're announcing their retirement if they're on the Republican side. That's how I view it. All right, Jeff, take it away. Who's your next pick? Oh, well, I guess...

The next most likely person, I think, among sort of the Republican candidates who are seeking the spot, I'll go with Mike Johnson of Louisiana. Johnson is the vice chair of the Republican conference, so a fairly high-ranking member of the House Republicans list.

And I think he occupies a little bit of the same space as someone like Hearn, but is from the Deep South, might connect more with Deep South members potentially. And do you recall that half of the Republican caucus is from the South? Yeah.

So I'm just – if you're sort of looking for people who have the potential. If you're just sort of grasping for straws. Well, no, but I think he's a longer straw than most of the other ones here to be fair to him. So from that perspective, he's also a member of the House Freedom Caucus. So –

If you're looking for maybe a more digestible House Freedom Caucus member to other parts of the Republican conference, given his role in leadership, he might be it. Jeff, I wonder if you're being too credulous of the list of nine people who are running. Yeah.

For example, Kevin McCarthy still hasn't been picked. Steve Scalise still hasn't been picked. Jim Jordan still hasn't been picked. Do you think all three of those people... Donald Trump still hasn't been picked. Do you think those people... Donald Trump is never going to be Speaker. And that's just like a fun one thing. Put that aside. Do you think Mike Johnson has a better chance than the resurrection of...

those other three? Well, I think he's never had... He's never lost a speaker race yet. So in a way, yes. Yes, I do. And I think that is...

You know, Jim Jordan, I think we've seen it's not happening. There's not a universe where it's going to happen. Could Kevin McCarthy make a comeback? Oh, yeah, sure. But I think the problem is that are the like eight people who voted to oust him going to go back on having created this gigantic mess? That might not look so good. So I think that's the reason why I am being at least somewhat credulous with the most sort of

Well-known names, even if people aren't that familiar with some of them, they do hold influential positions within the Republican conference. They are people who could potentially lead the Republican conference. So I like at least some of those names I think deserve some credulity.

All right, so we now have three picks each. We're going to do one final round. It's going to go really fast. We're going to flush out any other names that are out there, whether they're serious or unserious or what have you. So, Jeff, because of the snake draft, you're kicking us off. Who is your fire round draft pick?

Let's do one that I think also speaks to sort of the nature of we were talking earlier, like you don't want to seem like you want it. And that will make you maybe a more attractive candidate. Well, let's go with the guy who says he only wants it for the rest of this Congress and not beyond. And that's Jack Bergman of Michigan. Michigan's first, the Upper Peninsula, a youper.

Who is a retired general who's been in Congress for, what, four terms? Yeah, he's in his fourth term. And he's basically said, look, I want to just do the job for the rest of the Congress because we've got to –

create some order here and get things together. So in that sense, I'm, you know, if you're looking for someone who only wants power temporarily, which might be appealing given the circumstances here. And of course, you know, you can say that you want it temporarily, but maybe people like how you do the job and they say, hey, we should bring you back. But in sort of seeming like I want it, but I don't want it, he's sort of straddling that. And I feel like that's interesting. So I'm going to go with him. All right, Leah, fire round pick.

Kevin McCarthy, somebody should say his name. And yesterday on the Sunday shows, he did not rule out running. He clearly, it seems like he still wants it. Don't know how it would happen, but, you know, he's done it before. All right, Tia? I was going to say Kevin McCarthy. So since Leah picked him, I'll pick Donald Trump because...

There are some. Marjorie Taylor Greene, I think if Trump's name was out there, he would get some votes. I don't think he can get to 217, but he can probably get more votes than some of the other declared candidates, quite frankly.

I'm curious. Okay, so I get the idea of Donald Trump. I get the unlikely nature of that whole situation. One question I do have here, though, is, Leah, why did you pick Kevin McCarthy instead of Steve Scalise? Because Kevin McCarthy has gotten the vote before. That's really why. Because he's very tenacious and determined about

Scalise, I almost picked Scalise. It really could have been either one. Could have gone either way. But I went based on just temperament. And I feel like Kevin McCarthy still has the most people who want him and still wants it. Whereas Scalise, I'm just not. I just don't know. I just want to say, I agree because I think once Kevin McCarthy was taken out,

I get the sense that he's just waiting for them to crawl back and beg him to be speaker again. And he's just like biding his time. That's part of his master plan. Now, whether that all comes together. But I think in his mind, he's like, oh, they're going to need me. They're going to come back.

begging from me that's exactly it that's i mean that's totally credible that i mean it could happen i mean you know the eight members get it who who voted against them uh a couple of them could be like fine i'll vote president again and they'll figure it out or something you know but because because that of the comeback things that's definitely the most credible uh over say jordan or scalise

All right. Well, listeners, now it is your job to pick who you think won this draft. I'll go through all the names. Tia picked Austin Scott, Byron Donald, Susan Cole slash no one, and Donald Trump. Leah chose Pete Sessions, Patrick McHenry, David Valadao, and Kevin McCarthy. And Jeff, with

With the most vanilla list of all, you chose Tom Emmer, Kevin Hearn, Mike Johnson, and Jack Bergman. Someone had to do it. Let us know who you think won this first ever House Speaker Draft. But let's leave it there for now. Thank you, Tia, Leah, and Jeff. Up next, we're going to talk about the information environment surrounding the war in Israel and Gaza.

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Last week, a blast at a hospital in Gaza City became emblematic of the difficulty of getting good information about what is happening in the war between Israel and Hamas. On Tuesday, the Gaza health ministry claimed an Israeli airstrike killed hundreds, and that's what the American press largely reported. The Israeli military urged caution in reporting the claim.

On Wednesday, President Biden said the U.S. Defense Department had evidence showing the explosive had come from within Gaza. And two U.S. officials told ABC News that the Pentagon independently concluded the Gaza hospital blast was likely caused by a failed Islamic Jihad rocket.

And since then, other news outlets have independently concluded the same. For example, quote, CNN's analysis suggests that a rocket launched from within Gaza broke up midair and that the blast at the hospital was the result of part of the rocket landing at the hospital complex. But protests against Israel had already broken out across the region and here in the U.S., and plans for a summit between Biden and Arab leaders were called off.

And conflicting reports have been common since the initial Hamas attack on October 7th. So here with me to talk about this challenge is Ian Bremmer, president and founder of Eurasia Group and GZERO Media. Welcome to the podcast, Ian. Thanks, Caleb. What's going on here? Is this simply the fog of war or are these challenges to the information environment unique to this conflict?

I don't think it's unique to this conflict at all, but I think it's getting much, much worse. And in part, that's because so much of the information environment that is being reported on by the mainstream media is burst

coming up in social media and particularly on Twitter X. It's gotten much, much worse than certainly any conflict that I've ever professionally been involved in covering before in the toxicity, in the hatred, in the necessity of checking and rechecking for primary sources, even when you're talking about some of the most respected international media sources in the world.

How do we measure this, right? Like, it's, you know, it's a pretty big claim. You know, this is significantly worse. It's more toxic. It's more prevalent. How do we say that quantitatively? I've, as a political scientist, I've been covering these kinds of issues, every major geopolitical crisis for the last 30 years. I've never received 30 death threats in a week.

So it's the first time that's ever happened to me. By the way, they're from both sides of the political spectrum, and a lot of them are probably fake people and bots. So, I mean, who the hell knows what it means? But the point is, I've never, covering Russia, Ukraine, that never happened to me. Covering other major international crises, including those in the Middle East, like, for example, when Soleimani was assassinated by the United States in the Trump administration, I was covering that.

in ways that certainly would have been seen as provocative to people on different sides of that conflict. That never happened to me. I think the level of the major newspapers getting it wrong on the most serious issue that was being covered and then immediately getting picked up by members of government in the United States and by governments internationally who then refuse to change what they've said

on the back of the fact that they're getting a lot of support from that performative position. All of those things, yes, they're anecdotal, but they're new and they're drivers of conflict.

So what is going on here? Is it a change in the social media environment? Obviously, Elon Musk has purchased Twitter, what is now X, since the war in Ukraine began. So maybe that's a material difference. But I have a feeling that it's not just that. And maybe if you could explain to the extent you think it is a change in the social media environment versus other factors, people using motivated reasoning because they feel strongly about one position or the other or whatever it may be.

Israel-Palestine is probably the topic that you would have the hardest time bringing up in a family meal of vested participants, let's say for Christmas or Hanukkah. So let's be clear, of the tough ones out there, this is the toughest. People feel very, very strongly about their views and that surely is a piece of this, but I think it's a minority piece.

Polarization in the United States has grown over the past years and disinformation in the political environment. Before we talk about social media, talking about talk radio and cable news and just how much you're able to cater to.

an audience that knows what it wants to hear and follows trusted sources. That was becoming more true before social media. This is not the days of the three major networks and Walter Cronkite is a trusted figure by everybody. But I do believe that social media is a majority of the problem here. I'd put it at more than 50%. And I'm saying that broadly

In part because it's so much where young people are spending their time creating content, ingesting content. It's so much where the influencers on mainstream media are getting their direct sources from.

And then on top of that, you have artificial intelligence driving more disinformation, more disaggregated bots that are part of the process. And then you have Elon, who not only has ruined the blue check mark, taken verification to be a pay-for-play environment where there is more disinformation, not less, and that is algorithmically boosted, but also has personally...

been engaged with as one of the most important and powerful individual accounts on social media globally, has personally been engaged with and promoting some of the most toxic and hateful accounts that any of us would be in contact with. And I would not underestimate the impact that he has had individually

on this crisis. The concept of the fog of war has been around much, much longer than social media. Do you think that events like the one we saw with the hospital in Gaza and the misreporting there happen without social media? Like specifically, what role does social media play in what happened last week? Amplification, real time,

disinformation that everybody takes as fact, as opposed to not so sure about this. That source seems a little dodgy. Suddenly and within minutes, everyone is talking about it, including a whole bunch of verified accounts that you do trust, that you've been engaged with, and that spirals and spirals and spirals. And certainly that has been the case most dramatically with this hospital case. You had

Hamas sources on the ground in the middle of the night saying that there were 500 people dead from an Israeli strike. And that was carried in an unquestioning way by most of the mainstream media out there. By the way, left and right wing.

Then that was picked up immediately by everyone who wanted the Israelis to be responsible. By the way, this has happened on a bunch of things. I mean, this also happened with far lesser consequences and in a much smaller, smaller way with this idea that there were 40 babies that were beheaded.

in the beginning of the conflict. And there were lots of babies and children that were defenseless, that were killed, murdered in cold blood by Hamas. So I'm not trying to say that Hamas are nice guys, but there was no evidence of 40 babies that were beheaded, but this got picked up.

initially by a kind of misunderstanding communication by an Israeli journalist on the ground, that then the IDF, the Israeli Defense Forces picked up, then the Israeli government picked it up, then they discussed it with, not Yahoo, discussed it with Biden, Biden picked it up, and then it had to be walked back by the White House and eventually by the Israeli government itself. Now, in this case, there was no real knock-on effect in terms of policy impact.

but it's the same kind of stuff. When you're in a social media environment, like many of the people reading news about this conflict,

I mean, what do you do? Do you just ignore everything you see on social media? Because obviously social media has had beneficial impacts on people's lives as well, and maybe even the course of political history. So it seems like getting rid of it altogether or not trusting a single thing maybe also isn't the answer. Oh, clearly, Galen. And I wouldn't suggest that. But let's be clear. People are spending too much time on social media, way too much time. And they're using social media wrong. So

So what would I say on both of those? First is however much time you are spending getting your news on social media, reduce it. Stop. Probably half it. Maybe make it a quarter of what it was. It doesn't mean you don't spend time with your friends on social media and following other things that are interesting and fun. But when it comes to news, particularly political news that is deeply polarized, get less of it from social media.

When you're on social media, a couple of things that you can do more effectively. When I say get rid of it, do more long form reading, do more long form engaging, do more talking to actual people as opposed to being algorithmically intermediated by the for you feed. Spend more time with the people that you've curated as opposed to the ones that are being curated for you because that's not really for you, it's for the company. Keep in mind the for you feed

is actually the for Twitter X feed. It's not for you. You are the product, okay? Be very clear about that. But more broadly, don't follow accounts that only carry one side of the story. So on Israel-Palestine, most of the accounts that are actually algorithmically promoted on social media are only interested in the narrative and the suffering of one side.

If you are looking at an account that's only talking about how the Jews are getting killed and how Israel's doing the right thing, stop following that account. Just don't do it because that is not an account you can trust. It's like, you know, following people on Washington and, you know, you've got Trump accounts that would never say anything negative about Trump, would never say anything negative about Biden. If you find an account like that, don't follow it. It's not useful. It's not giving you any news at all. Literally, all it is is disinformation. I agree.

I think, I mean, disinformation is a strong word here, but I think there's like another- It's strong, but I think it's accurate. Honestly, Galen, I really do. There's another piece of the puzzle here, which is Gallup poll came out last week showing that Americans' trust in mass media has matched the record low that it hit in 2016. So only, you know, according to this poll, 32% of Americans say they trusted either a great deal or a fair amount.

And so not trusting mass media might lend more towards trusting the kinds of things that you're seeing online.

on social media. So maybe it's an issue of social media, and we've had conversations like this on the podcast before, and it's clear that it plays a role. But I think there's another piece here, which is that Americans don't trust institutions that, and maybe rightly so, maybe, maybe, not maybe, mass media has failed Americans at times in terms of giving them the correct information. And in this exact instance that we opened the podcast with, that was also the case.

Are there other areas of society that produce, that we can get our information from that need, that sort of need to do better? And like, how exactly do we go about this? Sure. Look, I mean, Galen, this is a much broader conversation and my willingness to blame social media for a majority of this does not somehow exculpate mainstream media or

from taking their eye off the ball. And I mean, it's not just that, it's government officials are increasingly seen as illegitimate, particularly in the United States. Doctors, the CDC,

increasingly seen as illegitimate and a political tool in the United States. The FBI, the Department of Justice, corporate leaders, bankers, journalists, I mean, sort of any credentialed

who is supposed to be someone that you listen to is seen as increasingly illegitimate, supporting the deep state in the pocket of something or someone and therefore not worthy of your being listened to. And why is that? Because over the last 50 years, larger and larger numbers of Americans feel that those in power have not cared about them.

I wrote this book about five years ago called "Us versus Them: The Failure of Globalism." And the basic idea behind that book is you had large numbers of people in the United States that were pursuing the ideas of the US should be the world's policeman, the United States should be the architect of global trade, the US should be the cheerleader of global values, particularly democracy. And the people that were promoting those ideas

were all people that were forgetting about the social contract at home. They were forgetting about taking care of the average American. And that has created an almighty backlash against everyone that is considered part of the elite community.

And whether you define the elite as the World Economic Forum or the Council on Foreign Relations or the Deep State or Washington or the New York Times or anything connected even tangentially or remotely with those people or Harvard University and the professors that are there who are indoctrinating your kids with all this horrible information. When you and I both know, Galen, that the majority of people in those organizations are

are just trying to actually do their jobs. They're not deeply politicized, part of some multi-headed secrecy hydra.

But that, I think, is all part of a piece, and it gets to what you're discussing around mainstream media. So where do you think this goes from here, maybe particularly as regards the war in the Middle East today? Have people learned their lesson? Does this actually end up affecting public opinion? I mean, obviously, we mostly focus on public opinion here and other kinds of data, but

But the information environment that we're talking about, is this ultimately going to come back around in the sort of form of public opinion and change people's views of the war one way or another and sort of affect politics as a result? I think it's going to harden the polarization. I mean, I saw at least the two members of the squad in the House of Representatives. They kept up their posts publicly.

about blaming the Israeli government and the IDF for those strikes with the 500 people that were killed in the hospital, all of which was false news. They kept that up in part because it was performing incredibly well with their base.

And so the fact that it might be wrong doesn't really matter. And if they're gonna take it down, they'll take it down with an absolute minimum of noise and it won't, nobody sees it. And that's the way the game works, right? And then, you know, the states in the region, the UAE at least backed off and called for an independent investigation.

which is kind of better than leaning into the lie that it was the Israelis. But I think, especially because my expectation of this war at this point, despite lots of people in the West wanting to avoid a ground war,

And knowing that this can escalate dramatically, I expect you're going to see a greater bombing campaign, troops on the ground, far more civilian casualties, much greater radicalization of Palestinians in the occupied territories, and more broadly, the refugees that are displaced. And that is going to harden opinion in the region as well as in the West.

for those that are very deeply pro-Israel and very deeply pro-Palestine. All right. Well, always good to leave things on a positive note, Ian. Did my best. Well, nonetheless, thank you so much. I really appreciate your insight into all of this. And just a reminder to be skeptical of information that you're reading in the moment. Thanks a lot, Ian. Absolutely good.

My name is Galen Drew. Tony Chow is in the control room. Our producers are Shane McKeon and Cameron Trotavian, and our intern is Jayla Everett. You can get in touch by emailing us at podcast.538.com. You can also, of course, tweet at us with any questions or comments. If you're a fan of the show, leave us a rating or review in the Apple Podcast Store or tell someone about us. Thanks for listening, and we will see you soon.