House speaker chaos stuns lawmakers, frays relationships and roils Washington

By STEPHEN GROVES
Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — For the first time ever, a House speaker had been voted out of leadership. Lawmakers were stunned Tuesday when the office of the speaker was declared vacant. Rep. Kevin McCarthy, a California Republican, has survived decades of upheaval in Congress. But he left a House roiling when he was ousted from the speaker’s position. An essential body of American democracy no longer has an elected leader as it still grapples with the aftermath of the insurrection on Jan. 6th, 2021, a Republican Party at war with itself and the United States’ role in global leadership.