It’s Tuesday, the traditional day for elections and for our pause-and-consider newsletter on politics and policy.

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MCCARTHY IS OUT
By Lisa Desjardins, @LisaDNews ([link removed])
Correspondent

For the first time in United States history, the House of Representatives has voted to oust its own speaker.

The vote is so perilous and serious for all sides that it has only ever occurred once before, more than a century ago. Then, the speaker survived.

Not now. We are in the House chamber writing this as the vote on McCarthy finishes. It is nearly silent here as a few hundred of the most powerful people in the world listen to a vote announcing the chamber’s (and Republicans’) inability to reach consensus on who should lead them. Rep. Patrick McHenry of North Carolina will be speaker pro tempore until a new speaker is elected.

What happened here?

This all grew directly out of Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s own deal to take power. To get the office, he agreed to a rule change allowing any one member to move to “vacate” the speakership, or push him out.

It is the American version of a no confidence vote. That January deal had nearly two dozen Republicans pushing for it.

Today’s move had fewer than half that, but still enough to push his speakership into an abyss. McCarthy briefly seemed to bet that Democrats would choose to back him rather than send the chamber into chaos.

Instead, years of distrust and McCarthy’s own attacks on Democrats led to him finding no support – and himself out of a job.

We have all witnessed a lot of history in the past few years, but this is one event that is particularly unusual. I will have more to write about this ahead, and report on the show ([link removed]) .

But suffice to say, this is uncharted territory.

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WHAT TO WATCH IN THE SUPREME COURT’S NEXT TERM.
By Marcia Coyle
Contributing analyst

The first week of a Supreme Court term generally conveys a sense of a fresh start. The justices’ summer break, as the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg often said, allows time to sooth any hard feelings among the justices following difficult or harsh opinions.

But last summer was different.

The Supreme Court began a new term this week with public support at a low ebb, ethics clouds hovering above two of its members, and a docket driven by challenges to social media platforms, gun laws, voting rights and more.

Published news accounts of undisclosed trips, entertainment and other offerings to Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito Jr. by some of the nation’s wealthiest men, some with business before the court, kept the court in an unflattering spotlight. Senate Democrats, some legal scholars and much of the public continued to pressure the court to adopt an ethics code for itself. Seventy-five percent of voters in a recent Politico poll support a binding ethics code, too.

Here are some key cases that the justices will decide in the new term. (Read the full list here ([link removed]) ).

Social media

The rights of the owners of social media platforms as well as users will undergo scrutiny in four cases.

Two cases involve laws enacted by Florida and Texas to regulate major social media platforms like Facebook, YouTube, and X (formerly known as Twitter). Both laws restrict platforms’ ability to engage in content moderation by removing, editing, or arranging user-generated content; require platforms to provide individualized explanations for certain forms of content moderation; and require general disclosures about platforms’ content moderation practices (Moody v. NetChoice; NetChoice v. Paxton).

The justices narrowed the issues they’ll consider for argument to whether the laws’ content moderation restrictions comply with the First Amendment and whether the laws’ individualized-explanation requirements comply with the First Amendment.

Two separate cases also raise the question of whether public officials, who use their personal social media accounts to communicate with the public, are acting as government officials and violate the First Amendment when they block their critics. One of the two cases involves two school board members, and the other, a city manager.

Guns

A section of the U.S. criminal code prohibits the possession of firearms by anyone under a domestic violence restraining order. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit ruled that the prohibition violates the Second Amendment because there was no historical analogue for such a ban in the 1700s or 1800s – the new test for Second Amendment cases. The justices will decide if that is correct in an appeal brought by the Biden Administration.

Voting Rights

With the 2024 elections fast approaching, the justices will likely see a number of voting rights challenges, given the number of lawsuits around the country. But their immediate focus is on a case from South Carolina. A three-judge panel ruled in January that the Republican-controlled legislature created an unconstitutional racial gerrymander by moving thousands of Black voters to a new district when it redrew congressional maps after the 2020 census.

South Carolina argues that partisan gain, not race, was the focus to ensure a safe Republican seat.
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** More on politics from our coverage:
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* Watch: “McCarthy did the right thing for the country ([link removed]) ” by avoiding a government shutdown, Former Sec. Hillary Clinton said in an exclusive interview with the NewsHour’s Geoff Bennett

* One Big Question: Laphonza Butler will fill the late Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s seat. What does itmean for ([link removed]) the Senate?

* A Closer Look: In her latest Crossroads dispatch, Judy Woodruff went to Tennessee ([link removed]) with a political theorist fighting to reinvent American democracy.

* Perspectives: Cassidy Hutchinson discusses what she saw ([link removed]) and experienced in the Trump White House.

#POLITICSTRIVIA
By Matt Loffman, @mattloff ([link removed])
Deputy senior producer, politics

By Erica R. Hendry, @ericarhendry
Senior managing editor, digital

This week’s level of turmoil around House leadership is unusual, but not new. While the House has never voted out a speaker before now, several reps in leadership have resigned at the threat of a motion to vacate -- most recently, John Bohener.

The last time the House voted to remove a speaker was more than 100 years ago.

Our question: When was the last time the House voted on removing a speaker and who was it?

Send your answers to [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) or tweet using #PoliticsTrivia. The first correct answers will earn a shoutout next week.

Last week, we asked: When was the shortest shutdown, and about how long did it last?

The answer: February 2018 ([link removed]) . The shortest U.S. government shutdown lasted less than a day. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., filibustered a government spending bill past midnight on the day of a funding deadline. It was resolved before 9 a.m. local time that same day.

Congratulations to our winners: Barry Weinstein and Darci Jayne!

Thank you all for reading and watching. We’ll drop into your inbox next week.
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