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Paul Ryan’s Conditions to be Speaker

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Rep. Paul Ryan (Wis.) moved closer to the House speakership Tuesday, telling fellow Republicans that he would consider taking the job if he could be assured that the caucus would unite behind him.

Ryan faced his colleagues — and his political future — at a private evening meeting of House Republicans in the Capitol basement. He said he would be willing to step into the speaker’s role, ending weeks of GOP leadership turmoil, as long as disparate factions moved in the coming days to support him.

“I hope it doesn’t sound conditional — but it is,” he said, according to members inside the room. He paused after saying the word “conditional,” they said, for effect.

Ryan, the 45-year-old chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee and a 2012 vice-presidential nominee, has for years resisted pressure to assume a higher-profile role in party leadership. And he signaled Tuesday that his decision to serve was far from final.

Much depends on what assurances of support he can win from Republican hard-liners. Before entering the evening meeting, Ryan met privately with leaders of the House Freedom Caucus, a hard-right group that helped push Speaker John A. Boehner out of his post and derailed Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s bid to succeed him.

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Source: Mike DeBonis and Robert Costa. https://www.washingtonpost.com