Minutes after House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., announced an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden’s business dealings, Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz said the probe was not enough to satisfy his desires to use the powers of Congress to wage war on the president’s administration.
The far-right Republican lawmaker said if McCarthy did not give into his demands he would begin the process of ousting the speaker.
“I rise today to serve notice: Mr. Speaker, you are out of compliance with the agreement that allowed you to assume this role,” Gaetz said on the House floor. “The path forward for the House of Representatives is to either bring you into immediate total compliance or remove you pursuant to a motion to vacate the chair.”
“This is a baby step following weeks of pressure from House conservatives to do more. We must move faster,” he added.
On a press call after his remarks on the House floor, Gaetz said he would hold votes to kick McCarthy from leadership every day if necessary.
"We're going to have them regularly. I don't anticipate them passing immediately. But I think that if we have to begin every single day in Congress with the prayer, the pledge and the motion to vacate, then so be it," he said, adding if McCarthy brough a stopgap measure to keep the government funded beyond a Sept. 30 deadline, he would immediately initiate a vote.
Gaetz and others on the right-wing of the House delegation want major spending cuts in any deal with Biden.
Gaetz said he was angered by McCarthy not holding up his end of the bargain that convinced the right-wing of his party to either support his speaker candidacy or not stand in the way. He said he wants votes on term limits and balanced budgets, the release of footage from the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, more investigations into Biden’s family -- specifically subpoenas of his son Hunter, who is the focus of the impeachment inquiry -- and the scrapping of a budget deal McCarthy cut with the president earlier this year.
“I will concede that the votes I have called for will likely fail: term limits, balanced budgets, maybe even impeachment,” Gaetz admitted on the House floor. “I am prepared for that eventuality because at least if we take votes, the American people get to see who's fighting for them and who's willing to tolerate more corruption.”
The Florida Republican said on the press call he was unsatisfied with the impeachment inquiry because "I have fallen for this mirage before," pointing to McCarthy's gestures of suppot to a potential impeachment of Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, which has not materialized.
"I say it's put up or shut up time, not just for McCarthy," but also for Republican members of Congress who got concessions from the speaker during his election, Gaetz said.
"Because if if we aren't serious about bringing him into compliance with the deal, then we were never really serious about the deal in the first place," he added.
Gaetz said the deal, which has not been made public, could be made available by Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, his fellow member of the hard-right House Freedom Caucus. He added the details he provided on the House floor and on the call were all in the agreement with McCarthy.
Earlier Tuesday, Gaetz appeared to take credit for pushing McCarthy to announce the inquiry after spending the weekend attacking the California Republican and threatening to remove him from leadership.
Due to House rules agreed to by McCarthy during the 15 rounds of voting it took to secure his speakership in January, any one member can initiate a vote to vacate, requiring the whole of Congress to vote again on who should lead the chamber. With a slim Republican majority, Gaetz said he would attempt to recruit Democrats to oust McCarthy, though some have already said they won’t join him in his plot.
“A motion to vacate might not pass at first, but it might before the 15th vote,” Gaetz said. “And if Democrats bail out McCarthy as they may do, then I will lead the resistance to this uniparty and the Biden-McCarthy-[House Democratic Leader Hakeem] Jeffries government that they are attempting to build.”
Gaetz declined to say if he spoke with former President Donald Trump, the GOP frontrunner in the 2024 presidential primary, before making his move. Trump has given McCarthy some support, but has urged the speaker to be more aggressive against Biden heading into next year's election. Gaetz is a major booster of Trump's campaign.
One thing Gaetz wants from the speaker is for Republicans to vote on defunding parts of the Department of Justice, including special counsel Jack Smith, who is prosecuting Trump in two criminal cases in Florida and Washington, D.C.