McCarthy Works to Stem Trump, GOP Backlash From Leaked Audio

(Bloomberg) -- House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy sought to head off backlash within the party that might dash his hopes of becoming speaker next year after an audio tape exposed he told colleagues he’d urge then-President Donald Trump to resign after last year’s Capitol insurrection.

In the audio recorded four days after the Jan. 6, 2021 riot by a mob of Trump supporters, McCarthy can be heard telling fellow Republicans during a leadership call that he planned to discuss with Trump the Democratic effort to impeach and remove him from office.

“The only discussion I would have with him is that I think this will pass, and it would be my recommendation you should resign,” McCarthy says in the recording, which was posted by the New York Times and has not been independently verified by Bloomberg.

The key for McCarthy and Republicans will be the reaction of Trump, who wields considerable influence in the party.

Trump and McCarthy spoke after the audio was released and the former president wasn’t upset about McCarthy’s remarks, the Washington Post reported on Friday.

McCarthy also has been making calls to some key House Republicans, assuring them that he and Trump are on good terms, according to a person familiar with the discussions. The person, who asked for anonymity because the talks were private, said the controversy was likely to blow over quickly.

There’s been little public criticism of McCarthy from other House Republicans. 

“I don’t think this is a story that is going anywhere” GOP Representative Nancy Mace of South Carolina said on Fox Business Friday. “I support Kevin McCarthy 100%.”

 Iowa Representative Ashley Hinson tweeted out her support for McCarthy Friday without making reference to the audio recording.

McCarthy’s office didn’t respond on Friday to a request for comment. 

McCarthy tweeted a denial of the New York Times story posted earlier on Thursday, before the audio was broadcast. He called the report “totally false and wrong.” 

The Times also published audio of another conference call on Jan. 10, 2021, which confirms what Bloomberg reported at the time -- that McCarthy told fellow Republicans that Trump had acknowledged having some responsibility for the riot.

McCarthy ultimately voted with 146 other Republicans against certifying presidential election results from some states, backing Trump’s false claim that he lost the 2020 race because of fraud. He also later voted against Trump’s impeachment.

There are numerous examples of Republicans who criticized Trump in the past but have stayed in his good graces by demonstrating loyalty. 

McCarthy has been a trusted Trump loyalist even before Trump took office. At an event the day before his inauguration, Trump referred to McCarthy as “my Kevin.”

McCarthy has publicly treaded lightly on matters that could draw Trump’s scrutiny, since he initially issued a rebuke of Trump on Jan. 6, declaring on the House floor that the former president “bears responsibility” for the mob attack on the Capitol.

The House panel investigating the insurrection, in requesting McCarthy’s testimony, cited comments the GOP leader made to CBS about his call with Trump while the mob swarmed the Capitol.

“I told him he needs to talk to the nation. I told him what was happening right then,” McCarthy said in that exchange. “I was very clear with the president when I called him. This has to stop and he has to go to the American public and tell them to stop this.”

Representative Jaime Herrera Beutler, a Washington State Republican, said McCarthy relayed to her a slightly different account of the call at the time. Her statement was entered into the official record of Trump’s second impeachment trial last January.

“When McCarthy finally reached the president on Jan. 6 and asked him to publicly and forcefully call off the riot, the president initially repeated the falsehood that it was antifa that had breached the Capitol,” the statement said. “McCarthy refuted that and told the president that these were Trump supporters. That’s when, according to McCarthy, the president said: ‘Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are.’”

McCarthy has refused to cooperate with the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection, denying requests for an interview. He also has met with Trump since then and has made other public expressions of loyalty to the former president. McCarthy endorsed the opponent of GOP Representative Liz Cheney, a persistent Trump critic, in Wyoming’s Republican primary.

Cheney, who was ousted from House Republican leadership for her criticism of Trump and his role in the Jan. 6 insurrection, was among those recorded on the call. 

A spokesman for Cheney, who is on a panel investigating the riot and Trump’s actions, said she did not record or leak the call and doesn’t know how the reporters got it. 

Representative Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, the only other Republican on the Jan. 6 panel, said in a tweet after the audio was released that McCarthy “ought to be ashamed. Republicans, your leaders think you are dumb. Let’s be done with them.”

Kinzinger is not running for reelection. 

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