How Patrick McHenry Kept House Running After GOP’s ‘Political Suicide’

WASHINGTON—A little more than three weeks after he took the gavel as speaker pro tempore and a day after he handed it back, Rep. Patrick McHenry was ready to tell his story.

McHenry told reporters Thursday that the ouster of Kevin McCarthy (R., Calif.) as speaker and the dysfunction it sparked were “well outside the normative bounds of this institution. That is a nice way to say it—or perhaps the dumbest set of politics for decision-making a majority party in this institution could make.”