Republican leader Kevin McCarthy is about to lose a sixth vote for House speaker - CNBC

WASHINGTON — In the sixth vote in two days, Republican leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., again failed to secure enough support to win the U.S. House speakership, setting the chamber up for another day of votes as the GOP regroups to try to hammer out a deal with a bloc of its most hardline conservatives.

A core group of 20 GOP holdouts, who voted for Florida Rep. Byron Donalds in several previous rounds of votes, were again throwing their weight behind the sophomore Republican. While the vote is still underway, McCarthy has already lost enough support to lose the gavel less than halfway through the roll call.

With 222 Republicans in the House, McCarthy can only afford to lose a handful of them and still win the 218 votes necessary to take the gavel.

All 212 Democrats voted for that party's incoming Minority Leader, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y.

Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., renominated Donalds in the fifth round of voting before asking McCarthy to withdraw his name.

"You've been having my favorite president call us and tell us we need to knock this off," Boebert said on the House floor, referring to former President Donald Trump. "I think it actually needs to be reversed. The president needs to tell Kevin McCarthy that, 'sir, you do not have the votes and it's time to withdraw.'"

U.S. Rep.-elect Lauren Boebert (R-CO) delivers remarks in the House Chamber during the second day of elections for Speaker of the House at the U.S. Capitol Building on January 04, 2023 in Washington, DC.

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Together, Donalds and Jeffries marked the first time that two Black Americans have ever been nominated for House speaker.

Donalds, who was nominated by Texas Republican Chip Roy, told reporters outside the chamber that he would reinstate a House rule to "vacate the chair" if he were elected. That would make it easier to replace the future House speaker.

Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., made it more difficult to change House leadership by requiring a party leader or a majority vote by one party to force the vote. Donalds said any member of the chamber should be allowed to call for a vote on the House leader.

"This was a mainstay rule in our chamber that empowered all the members of Congress," said Donalds, who on Tuesday had publicly shifted his support away from McCarthy. "And Nancy Pelosi is the one who stripped it. And so we think it is important for our institution to function correctly on behalf of the American people to put it back in place."

When asked about national security concerns while Congress in limbo, Donalds said a hypothetical threat shouldn't affect the voting process.

"I would anticipate (President Joe Biden) would act to secure the homeland to take care of the American people," he said. "When it comes to leveraging money to be spent in response, that's something the members would have to put into their calculus as well. But that doesn't mean that we should speed up our business here for some (hypothetical) that may exist at some point."

Democrats could help McCarthy by withholding their votes, which would reduce the number of votes he needed to win House Speaker, according to the Intercept. But former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. Pelosi and others have reportedly dismissed that out of hand.

Pelosi told reporters outside the House floor earlier Wednesday that the Republican chaos revealed "a lack of respect for this institution."

"There's a lack of respect for the sworn duty we all have to defend the Constitution and get the job done for the American people," she told reporters in the Capitol on Wednesday.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) is seen at the US Capitol in Washington, DC on December 21, 2022.

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Little appeared to have changed, publicly or privately, between Tuesday and Wednesday. Both McCarthy's allies and his opponents delivered effectively the same message in interviews Wednesday that they have been for weeks: We're not going to budge.

One exception to the stalemate was a fresh endorsement for McCarthy from Trump, who on Tuesday afternoon had initially sounded an uncertain note about the political future of one of his most loyal allies in Congress.

"REPUBLICANS, DO NOT TURN A GREAT TRIUMPH INTO A GIANT & EMBARRASSING DEFEAT," Trump posted on his Truth Social website Wednesday morning. "IT'S TIME TO CELEBRATE, YOU DESERVE IT. Kevin McCarthy will do a good job, and maybe even a GREAT JOB – JUST WATCH!"

Despite Trump's broad support among conservative Republican voters, it was not clear his new endorsement would move the needle for any of the holdouts in Congress. While the group of 20 far-right Republicans are all close Trump allies, the former president's name and his "America First" message have been notably absent from the intraparty GOP debate raging behind closed doors.

McCarthy himself was tight lipped Tuesday and into Wednesday, and he declined to give interviews or take his message to the airwaves or social media.

When asked Wednesday morning what his plan would be, NBC News reported that McCarthy told reporters at the Capitol, "Same game plan as yesterday."

When a journalist asked how he would get more votes, McCarthy replied: "We're sitting, we're talking ... I think we can get to an agreement."

Instead, he authorized a handful of allies to negotiate with the holdouts, many of whom identify with the Freedom Caucus, a loosely organized 40+ member caucus led by Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Scott Perry, who is among the most outspoken opponents of McCarthy's speaker bid.

This is a developing story, please check back for updates.