Democrat mocks GOP disarray posing with popcorn bag ahead of speaker vote

Representative Ted Lieu mocked Republicans‘ disarray ahead of the vote to select the next speaker of the House by posing with a bag of popcorn on Twitter.

Congress convened on Tuesday to vote on the next House speaker, but questions remained about who would eventually win the election.

Republicans, who hold a narrow majority in the House, were divided as several Freedom Caucus members vowed to oppose California Representative Kevin McCarthy, who has otherwise secured support from most of the conference. Their opposition could derail McCarthy’s bid and lead to a long struggle to select a speaker.

Lieu, a California Democrat, poked fun at the chaos in a tweet, posting a photograph of him holding a bag of popcorn captioned, “about to go to the House Floor,” essentially drawing a comparison between the speakership ordeal and entertainment.

Lieu’s tweet went viral, being viewed nearly one million times and receiving more than 60,000 likes so far as Democrats cheered on Republican infighting. Other House Democrats also tweeted out jokes.

Representative Bill Pascrell of New Jersey, tweeted, “current update from the House floor: republicans in disarray,” alongside an emoji of a popcorn bucket.

Representative Robert Garcia, a newly-elected congressman from California, tweeted the “this is fine” meme about the chaos.

Representative Sara Jacobs of California tweeted a meme from the Broadway musical Hamilton, captioned “you don’t have the votes,” a lyric from “Cabinet Battle 1.”

McCarthy failed to win enough support from Republicans on the first ballot, with 19 members of his conference—including many members of the House Freedom Caucus—voting against him. His loss makes him the first potential Speaker to lose on the first ballot in 100 years.

Some Freedom Caucus members have made several demands to change the rules of the House in an effort to weaken the powers of the Speaker and bolster the power of the party’s right-wing flank. Even though McCarthy has made concessions, many are still refusing to support him.

Even though Republicans won more congressional seats than Democrats in the midterms, their thin majority leaves them little room for defectors. Assuming all members were present, McCarthy could only afford to lose four votes, notably less than what he lost on the first ballot.

Uncertainty defined the next steps as the House seeks its next leader. McCarthy will be forced to try to whip more conservative members to win their support, but it remains unknown if they will budge. Some Republicans have called for other high-profile members of Congress to run instead of McCarthy. Meanwhile, some have floated a unity speaker who would need to build a coalition of centrists from both parties.

Newsweek reached out to Lieu for comment.