Two Republicans announced their bids to replace Rep. Kevin McCarthy as House speaker Wednesday, and a third appeared to rule himself out. Donald Trump, speaking to reporters outside the Manhattan courthouse where his civil fraud trial is taking place, said he is "totally" focused on his presidential campaign, the Hill reports. "If I can help them during the process, I would do it," he said of House Republicans. "But we have some great people in the Republican Party that could do a great job as speaker."
The speaker of the House does not need to be a member of the House, and Republican lawmakers including Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene have suggested bringing Trump in, the AP reports. Asked about Greene's support, Trump said: "I think she's a wonderful woman. I'll do whatever it is to help, but my focus, my total focus is being president and, quite honestly, making America great again."
On Tuesday, hours after McCarthy was ousted, Fox host Sean Hannity said some House Republicans have "been in contact with and have started an effort to draft" the former president, the Guardian reports. Rep. Jim Jordan, who announced his bid for speaker Wednesday, told Hannity that if Trump "wants to be speaker, great, but I want him to be president of the United States." Even before Trump ruled himself out, analysts said there was next to no chance of him becoming speaker. Democratic Rep. Sean Casten noted that House Republican rules calls for leaders to step aside if "indicted for a felony for which a sentence of two or more years imprisonment may be imposed." (More Donald Trump stories.)
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