MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell on Monday said Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) had landed “another entry in the record books for the strangest and most stupidly-phrased things said” by a speaker of the House.
O’Donnell pointed to a New York Times article in which McCarthy was quoted as telling a friend: “I will never leave that woman. I will always take care of her.”
McCarthy wasn’t “talking about his wife of 31 years, the mother of his two children,” noted O’Donnell.
Instead, McCarthy was reportedly making a political marriage vow to extremist Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.). The Times article — titled “How Kevin McCarthy Forged an Ironclad Bond With Marjorie Taylor Greene” — explained how Greene’s help was crucial in McCarthy finally winning his drawn-out bid for the speakership.
McCarthy “can only hope no one back home in Bakersfield, California, was reading The New York Times today,” O’Donnell added.