Political analyst and author Dick Morris told Newsmax on Monday that a fractured House Republican conference might be losing something important while members bicker over who will be next to hold the speaker's gavel.
"The majority of the American people are absolutely appalled that in the middle of what's going on in the Middle East and the crises the world faces, the Republicans are squabbling of who is going to have that gavel," Morris, a former presidential adviser to Bill Clinton and Donald Trump, told "Rob Schmitt Tonight."
"What they can end up doing is blowing it. They'll end up losing all the chairmanships and the majority and the whole bit and, to boot, being seen by the country as incapable of governing.
"The stakes are so high and the big differences in ideology are minuscule. This is a battle of egos and personalities that can get out of hand and lead ... Democrats to taking power again."
Eight House Republicans, with help from Democrats, won a motion to vacate vote to oust Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., as speaker on Oct. 3. Since then, the GOP nominated Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., to replace McCarthy; but Scalise dropped out late Thursday after he was unable to muster the 217 votes needed to secure the job.
Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, is the GOP's latest nominee, and a floor vote on his nomination is set for Monday.
Morris, host of "Dick Morris Democracy" Saturdays on Newsmax, said Republicans have long been hamstrung by some members unwilling to engage with Democrats in the budget battle, especially when it comes to a government shutdown.
Morris likened it to a Mark Twain quote: "'The cat that sits down on a hot stove lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove lid again, and that is well, but also she will never sit down on a cold one anymore.'
"The Republicans are so traumatized and terrified by having been mangled by the Democrats in the various government-closure fights that they're scared to death to go into it," Morris said. "But a strong Republican effort based on defunding the weaponization of the FBI and controlling the growth of federal spending would work, and the Republicans would win, and the Democrats would lose.
"They just need to have the confidence of their own convictions to go and do that."
About NEWSMAX TV:
NEWSMAX is the fastest-growing cable news channel in America!