Nominated to be speaker of the House of Representatives, Rep. Steve Scalise on Thursday ran headlong into a familiar, growing Republican problem: Skeptical Republican colleagues are refusing to throw their support behind him and denying him the majority vote needed to win the gavel.

Frustrations mounted as the crisis deepened and Republicans lost another day without a Speaker of the House of Representatives. Scalise needs to take away more than 100 votes, mostly from those who supported his main rival, Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, the Judiciary Committee chairman favored by hardliners, who announced he was no longer in the running and shifted his vote to Scalise threw .

But many hardliners who followed Donald Trump’s lead have dug in for a protracted battle to replace Rep. Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield after his historic resignation from the position. They argue that Majority Leader Scalise is not a better choice, that he should focus on his health as he battles cancer, and that he is not the leader they will support. No House votes were scheduled.

We’re going to get this done, Scalise said after another closed-door meeting at the Capitol.

Scalise, from Louisiana, said he answered every question thrown at him and promised to elaborate on the issues raised during the two-hour session. But there is no easy endgame in sight.

Time is of the essence, McCarthy said as he arrived at the Capitol.

Asked whether it was still possible for Scalise to find enough support, McCarthy replied: It’s possible it’s a big hill.

The House of Representatives is entering its second week without a chairman and can effectively no longer function. Political pressure is mounting on Republicans to change course, reassert majority control and govern in Congress.

Action is needed to fund the government or meet the threat of a federal shutdown within a month. Lawmakers also want Congress to make a strong statement of support for Israel in its war with Hamas, but a bipartisan resolution has been sidelined by the stalemate in the House of Representatives. The White House is expected to soon ask for money for Israel, Ukraine and replenishing the US weapons stockpile.

The situation is not entirely different from early in the year, when McCarthy faced a similar backlash from another group of far-right holdouts who ultimately used their votes to elect him chairman and subsequently brought about his historic downfall.

But the math is even trickier this time. Scalise, who is seen as a hero by some colleagues for surviving a shooting over legislation during a baseball game in Congress in 2017, won the Republican vote behind closed doors, 113 to 99. But McCarth noted that Scalise, a longtime rival , had indicated he would have 150 votes behind closed doors, but missed that target.

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needs 217 votes to reach a majority that will likely be needed in a floor fight with the Democrats. The chamber is narrowly divided 221 to 212, with two vacancies, meaning Scalise could lose only a few Republicans if opposition comes from Democrats who will most certainly support their own leader, New York Rep. Hakeem Jeffries. Absences in the run-up to the weekend could lower the required majority threshold.

Exasperated Democrats, who have watched and waited for Republicans to recover from McCarthy’s impeachment, urged them to find out and warned that the world was watching.

House Republicans must now end the Republican civil war, Jeffries said.

Democrats in the House of Representatives have continued to make clear that we are ready, willing and able to find a bipartisan path forward, he said, encouraging that the House of Representatives would reopen and implement the Republican-led Party-led rules would change that allowed a single lawmaker to initiate the process of abolishing elections. The speaker.

While Congress did nothing, Republicans spent a second day behind closed doors, arguing and airing their grievances, but failing to follow their own party rules and unite behind the nominee.

Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas) said the meeting so far has been marked by emotional objections to voting for Scalise.

It’s not for your personal grievances, but unfortunately that’s what I keep seeing, he said.

Some Republicans simply took their Chick-fil-A lunch to-go.

Jordan, a founding member of the House Freedom Caucus that Trump endorsed in the speaker’s race, announced he did not plan to continue running for the leadership position.

We need to come together and support Steve, Jordan told reporters before the closed session.

It was the strongest show of support yet from Jordan, who had offered to give his rival a nomination speech and privately told lawmakers he would vote for Scalise and encouraged his colleagues to do the same.

But it wasn’t enough to sway the holdouts.

A handful of hardliners announced they were sticking with Jordan, McCarthy or someone other than Scalise.

Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Texas) reaffirmed his support for Trump for speaker; the position does not have to go to a member of Congress.

Trump, the front-runner for the Republican Party’s 2024 nomination, repeatedly discussed Scalise’s health during a radio interview that aired Thursday.

Well, I like Steve. I like them both a lot. But the problem, you know, Steve is a man who is in serious trouble, from the standpoint of his cancer, Trump said on Fox News host Brian Kilmeade’s radio show.

Scalise has been diagnosed with and is being treated for a form of blood cancer known as multiple myeloma.

I think maybe in both cases it will be very difficult to get anyone, Trump said. “And then you get into one of these crazy standoffs. It’s a very interesting situation.

Otherwise, Trump is expected to take a hands-off approach to Republicans’ internal struggles now that Scalise, rather than his choice of Jordan, is the nominee, according to a person familiar with Trump’s thinking who spoke on condition of anonymity .

Many Republicans want to avoid the spectacle of a messy floor fight in the House of Representatives, like the grueling brawl in January when McCarthy became speaker.

Others said it was time for Republicans to come out from behind closed doors and vote.

Stop trolling, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) said on social media. If Kevin McCarthy had to do 15 rounds, the next speaker should be able to do the same or more if necessary.