McCarthy also said during the conversation that he wanted to contact then-elected President Joe Biden, as he expressed hope for a “smooth transition” and said he believed impeachment would divide the nation even more.
The call took place on January 8, 2021, and the audio was received for the new book “This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden and the Battle for the Future of America” by Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns.
At one point in the recording, McCarthy asked an aide to read what Democrats in the House of Representatives were discussing internally. The aide replied: “I think the options cited by Democrats so far are the 25th Amendment, which is not exactly an elegant solution here.”
McCarthy intervened and said: “It also takes too long. He can go back to the House, can’t he?
The assistant answers: “Correct. If the president sends a letter of resignation to the cabinet and vice president, two-thirds of the votes in the House of Representatives and the Senate will repeal the president. So it’s kind of like a hand. ”
On the same day, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sent a letter, “Dear Colleague,” to Democrats in the House of Representatives, raising the 25th Amendment as an option. The House eventually voted days later on a resolution calling on the vice president to activate the 25th Amendment, with only one Republican, Republican Adam Kinsinger of Illinois, joining all Democrats to support the measure.
CNN contacted McCarthy’s office to comment on the new audio.
At the beginning of the audio, McCarthy could be heard saying, “What the president did is cruel and completely wrong,” comments previously reported by The New York Times. After the deadly attack on the Capitol, a number of Democrats, including members of the leadership, publicly called for then-President Donald Trump to be removed either by impeachment or the 25th Amendment to the Constitution.
Citing the 25th Amendment would require then-Vice President Mike Pence and a majority in the cabinet to vote in favor of removing Trump for failing to “fulfill the powers and duties of his cabinet” – an unprecedented step.
McCarthy’s new audio edition is the latest in a series of similar editions featuring the leader of the People’s Party of the House, which sheds light on what he said in private to other Republicans in the House of Representatives after the January 6 attack. And the fact that McCarthy pressed one of his aides for details on how the 25th Amendment process would work shows that there was a serious conversation at the highest levels of the Republican leadership about the idea – not just empty chatter – even if it was ultimately considered not a viable option.
An audio recording last month showed that McCarthy was indeed considering asking Trump to resign in the days after the uprising, contrary to earlier denials by his New York Times office that he had done so. Audio also showed that in the days after the uprising, McCarthy told Republicans during a private conference call that Trump had admitted that he had some responsibility for the deadly attack. private, and he commented on the talk of the 25th Amendment. McCarthy, who initially flatly denied the Times’s reports before the audio recordings of those talks were released, said he was simply proposing potential scenarios for Trump’s future and did not advocate one option over another. “I never asked the president to submit “I never thought he should resign,” McCarthy said in April when he was pressured to believe that at one point he believed Trump should resign. it was about the process, the 25th Amendment, whether someone had been impeached. We looked at “if,” “and” and “but.” It was never in the process of asking Trump to resign. “
For his part, Trump said after the initial audio recordings were released that while he did not like what he heard McCarthy say, their relationship remained strong – in part because McCarthy was working so hard after Jan. 6 to win his support.
In the new audio, McCarthy can also be heard discussing the desire to contact Biden.
“I think impeachment divides the nation even more and the struggle continues even greater. That’s why I want to contact Biden. I wanted the president to meet with Biden; that’s not going to happen, “McCarthy said, adding,” I want to see Biden meet, sit down, make a smooth transition to show this, and continue to support those statements. ”
McCarthy, who said he had breakfast with Biden when he was vice president, also spoke about what would be best for Biden, arguing that a smooth transition “would benefit his presidency as well” and that Biden would be in a “stronger” position if he begs the country to move forward.
McCarthy can also be heard saying on the tape: “I’m trying to do it not on the basis of Republicans, on the basis of, hey, it’s not healthy for the nation. This is a conversation I want to have with Biden himself. “
This story was updated with further developments on Wednesday and further details.
Lauren Fox of CNN contributed to this report.
Add Comment