McCarthy pushes back on characterization as ‘weak’ leader

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Tuesday brushed aside comments that he and Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) look like “weak leaders” after a majority of Republicans ignored their advice and pressed ahead with a plan to gut an independent ethics office.

“At my house, I got my wife and my two kids, and I usually don’t win what we watch on TV,” McCarthy explained to reporters during a briefing in his Capitol office. “The Speaker has set up a very open conference. We put a [rules] package together and people could offer amendments and people could have that debate.

“And when you’re able to have that debate, you go forward.”

McCarthy said he spoke up against the proposed rules change Monday night during a closed-door House GOP meeting, making the point that overhauling the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) would distract from other GOP priorities in the opening week of the 115th Congress.

{mosads}That was the same argument President-elect Donald Trump made in a tweet Tuesday morning.

But McCarthy and Ryan were on the losing end of a vote to include the ethics proposal in a House rules package that will be considered Tuesday afternoon. 

McCarthy had some difficulty explaining to reporters exactly what the proposal by Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) would do, though he argued it is being misrepresented in the press. As written, the Goodlatte amendment would put the once-independent OCE under the oversight of the House Ethics Committee.

“The headlines I see are that the agency is being taken away, that it’s not there, and that’s not the case,” McCarthy said.