Donalds reflects on run for House Speaker
For several days this month, the House of Representatives was in a state of paralysis, the Congress unable to function without a Speaker of the House.
Congressman Byron Donalds (R-Naples), who represents Fort Myers Beach, most of Lee County and Collier County, was part of it all, running for the speakership for two days before pulling out.
“For me personally, it was pretty surreal to be nominated,” Donalds said.
With the ascension of the Republicans to the majority of the House and the stepping down of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy was the presumed Speaker in waiting. He even moved his office into the Speaker’s office before being elected to the speakership.
Yet there were loud rumblings that right-wing members of the Republican Party Freedom Caucus did not want him to lead the chamber. It would take McCarthy 15 ballots over the course of a week to win the election for House Speaker.
After voting for McCarthy on the first two ballots, Donalds switched to Jim Jordan before being nominated by Lauren Boebert (R-Colorado) for House Speaker on the fourth ballot. Donalds would give his support back to McCarthy on the 12th ballot two days later.
Reflecting this past week on the high scale drama, Donalds said he was “happy to help my colleagues so we could finally get back to work.”
Donalds said an agreement was finally brokered that ended the standoff over McCarthy.
“We sat at the table and negotiated out some critical things to make everybody comfortable,” he said.
“We had a situation where we were kind of deadlocked. Members came up to me about my willingness (to run for Speaker). It was about trying to find ways to make things work,” Donalds said.
Donalds said the critical piece of the agreement was restoring the ability of a single member to initiate a vote to remove the House Speaker. Donalds criticized Pelosi for removing that lever of power for legislators. Donalds said that action “put more power in the hands of the Speaker.”
Congress was “not a representative republic,” he said.
Another outcome of the agreement will be “more teeth on the committees to investigate the government going after free speech,” Donalds said.
“We want to make sure we are doing the people’s job to hold government accountable,” he said. “We are going to work hard and show the people they did the right thing to choose Republicans to lead the House,” he said.
Donalds ran unsuccessfully in November for Conference Chair against sitting chair Elise Stefanik (R-New York), for the third-highest ranking position in the House Republican Party. Donalds was recently appointed to the finance committee where he expects to work on banking regulations and access to capital legislation.
Going forward, Donalds said voters can expect to see Republicans in the House tackle immigration, economic issues and investigations into President Joe Biden.
“The first thing we did was what we said we were going to do, we repealed the 87,000 IRS agents (which was approved last year by the Congress),” Donalds said.
As for Fort Myers Beach, Donalds said he expects there will be some supplemental aid to the island in its recovery from Hurricane Ian.
“The biggest thing for Fort Myers Beach is to continue the hard work they are doing. We are going to do everything we can to make sure they aren’t left behind,” Donalds said.
To reach NATHAN MAYBERG, please email nmayberg@breezenewspapers