Former President Donald Trump declined to confirm whether he’d continue to endorse Rep. Kevin McCarthy as the new Speaker of the House in a Tuesday interview, answering evasively after the California representative struggled in vain to lock in the House’s top job. “I got everybody calling me wanting my support…” Trump said in a brief phone conversation with a reporter for NBC News. “That’s all I can say. But we’ll see what happens. We’ll see how it all works out.” In December, the former president cemented his support for McCarthy, telling Breitbart, “I think he deserves the shot. Hopefully, he’s going to be very strong and going to be very good and he’s going to do what everybody wants.” He urged holdout GOP members to drop their opposition, warning them that they were “playing a very dangerous game.” Despite the ringing endorsement, McCarthy repeatedly fell short of the required 218 votes in the full House in three embarrassing rounds on Tuesday. McCarthy is the first House speaker nominee in a century to fail to secure the gig with his party firmly in the majority.
EXCLUSIVE: Former President Trump declined to say if he's sticking by his endorsement of Kevin McCarthy for speaker tonight, telling me in a brief phone interview he's had calls all day asking for support, and "We'll see what happens. We'll see how it all works out."
