Former Speaker McCarthy's Seat: Who Will Replace Him?

BAKERSFIELD, CA--Not one to start off the year strong, the addled and unorganized House of Representatives has been hit with yet another resignation, this time coming in the form of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA). This news is not necessarily a surprise, though, to be frank. The past few months have not been kind to the Republican, with him being unceremoniously ousted from the speakership by his conservative peers, and with his supposed ally Donald Trump doing little to help him. Topping it all off with him failing to regain prominence in his party in the wake of his ouster, it makes sense why he would choose to resign. All of this, though, is old news at this point–the real story here is that there is now a vacancy in the House of Representatives, and someone needs to fill it… but who?

As our news partner CBS Los Angeles notes, former Speaker McCarthy came from a very, very red district of California. In a normal state of politics, it could be almost guaranteed that his successor would be a Republican, too–but this is not a normal state of politics. Precedent and normalcy were thrown aside when a conservative faction of the House ousted McCarthy, so it would seem fitting to look at this vacancy in terms “anything could happen”. For this reason, I think it would be wise to consider that a Democrat could take the seat, instead of a conservative. We’ve seen districts flip before; George Santos (R-NY) recently took a seat in the previously blue 3rd District of New York, for example, and the seat may flip back to being blue once more if Tom Suozzi wins the seat in the upcoming special election. Considering how McCarthy, at least toward the end of his term, was considered an ineffective representative by his peers, Bakersfield voters might want to see a different kind of candidate replace him, potentially from a different party.

Of course, this is all conjecture right now, with the special election only really being announced within the past few days. It has yet to be seen what kinds of candidates are going to compete for McCarthy’s seat, and if any of them are going to be from the Democrat party. What we can all hope for, though, is that whoever takes his spot can help to mend a broken House.