Cable News Sent Into Overdrive as Drama in Congress Unfolds

Cable news went into overdrive on a peculiar day in Washington, D.C., in which the House of Representatives voted to oust Kevin McCarthy as speaker and, in one of his first actions as speaker pro tempore, Rep. Patrick T. McHenry ordered speaker emerita Nancy Pelosi to vacate her private Capitol office.

“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” “CNN Tonight” anchor Laura Coates said late Tuesday night of the swirl of events in Congress.

CNN and MSNBC were among the news channels focusing heavily on the events unfolding in Congress on Tuesday, including McCarthy’s decision to not run for speaker again after the House ousted him from the top position by a historic vote of 216-210.

Rep. McHenry, a 10-term Republican from North Carolina who was appointed interim House speaker, ordered Pelosi to “immediately” vacate her private office in the Capitol by Wednesday.

Following the news of McHenry’s eviction notice, Pelosi issued a statement: “With all of the important decisions that the new Republican Leadership must address, which we are all eagerly awaiting, one of the first actions taken by the new Speaker Pro Tempore was to order me to immediately vacate my office in the Capitol. Sadly, because I am in California to mourn the loss and pay tribute to my dear friend Dianne Feinstein, I am unable to retrieve my belongings at this time.”

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Pelosi also noted in her statement that “this eviction is a sharp departure from tradition” and noted that the first time she took over as House speaker in 2007, she gave her GOP predecessor “a significantly larger suite of offices for as long as he wished.”

Pelosi has represented the San Francisco area in the House since 1987. She was the first female leader to serve as Speaker of the House, from 2007 to 2011 and from 2019 until November 2022. Pelosi in her lengthy statement took at swipe at the GOP for taking action on office space allocations in the face of the showdown over budget talks.

“Office space doesn’t matter to me, but it seems to be important to them. Now that the new Republican Leadership has settled this important matter, let’s hope they get to work on what’s truly important for the American people,” Pelosi wrote.

(Pictured: Kevin McCarthy, Nancy Pelosi)