(Monaca Pa.) On Sunday night the 117th Congress of the United States started the term by holding an election for the Speaker of the House. Nancy Pelosi a California Democrat is the only women speaker in US history. This election was set to be possibly be the closest challenge to date of her three other terms as Speaker of the House. With the Democrats having a slim majority and the COVID-19 Pandemic effecting Congress members who could and couldn’t vote. In the end Pelosi was selected to her fourth term with the gavel.
Pelosi won with 216 votes to House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy‘s 209. Not a single Republican defected from McCarthy, compared to six in 2019.
But Pelosi’s appointment wasn’t agreeable by five Democratic members of Congress including local Congressman from the 17th District Conor Lamb. Rep. Lamb voted for House Democratic Caucus Chairman Hakeem Jeffries a New York Democrat, who is considered a rising star in the caucus ranks. Back in 2019 Lamb also went against the majority of Democrats and cast his vote for Speaker for former Rep. Joe Kennedy. Beaver County Radio reached out to Rep. Lamb’s team to find out why he voted the way he did and via e-mail statement the Congress man said ““When I first ran for Congress three years ago, my constituents told me they wanted new leadership across the board, and I promised to vote for new leadership even in my own party. That’s what I did again yesterday.”
As for the other four Congressman that voted for someone other than Pelosi Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine) cast his Speaker vote for Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), a former House member turned senator who was considered a potential running mate for President-elect Joe Biden last year and the other three voted “present”: Reps. Mikie Sherrill (N.J.), Elissa Slotkin (Mich.) and Abigail Spanberger (Va.).