Kevin McCarthy appears to throw GOP broker 'under the bus' in rebuke of House's Jan. 6 commission deal

published 18 May 2021

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Tuesday slammed the House's Jan. 6 commission deal, and in the process appeared to throw Rep. John Katko (R-N.Y.), the Republican he reportedly tasked with negotiating the legislation, "under the bus."

In a statement, McCarthy specifically complained that the commission was too narrow. He and other Republicans want it to examine what he calls "interrelated forms of political violence" in the U.S., including the Black Lives Matter protests from last summer, and he accused the bipartisan deal of focusing mostly on the Capitol riot.

While McCarthy's opposition to the apparently not-so-bipartisan-deal isn't surprising, some analysts are questioning why he had Katko negotiate in the first place. Perhaps recognizing the position Katko was in, McCarthy did appear to take a softer tone after a GOP conference meeting later on Tuesday, telling Politico's Melanie Zanona that his colleague "worked hard to improve the bill, but it's just not there yet."

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Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.