Interim House Speaker ‘evicts’ two senior Democrats from Capitol

Nancy Pelosi and her long-time deputy Steny Hoyer have been ordered to leave their work spaces in the US Capitol by acting House Speaker Patrick McHenry.

Both were told locks on their office doors will be “re-keyed” on Wednesday. The evictions come after Kevin McCarthy was ousted from the chamber’s plum post on Tuesday and Mr McHenry, a top loyalist, was appointed in the interim.

Mrs Pelosi, who is not currently in Washington, criticised the decision as “a sharp departure from tradition”. Her office will be handed over to Mr McCarthy, Republican Congressman Garret Graves announced on Wednesday, saying that it is supposed to belong to the “preceding speaker”.

“Now that she and other Democrats have caused there to be an immediately preceding speaker, she has removed herself from that office, that was a decision that Democrats and Speaker Pelosi made in giving that office to McCarthy,” he said, according to Axios.

Mrs Pelosi released a statement on Tuesday slamming the decision. “With all of the important decisions that the new Republican Leadership must address, which we are all eagerly awaiting, one of the first actions taken by the new Speaker Pro Tempore was to order me to immediately vacate my office in the Capitol,” she said. “Sadly, because I am in California to mourn the loss of and pay tribute to my dear friend Dianne Feinstein, I am unable to retrieve my belongings at this time.”

Ms Feinstein, a California senator who served for more than three decades, died aged 90 last week. Her funeral will take place this Thursday.

While it is rare for members of Congress who are not in leadership roles to have offices in the Capitol building, Mrs Pelosi and Mr Hoyer had so-called hideaways as former Speaker and Majority Leader.

Mrs Pelosi noted in her statement that, in line with the tradition, she had given her Republican predecessor office space while she was Speaker. Both Democrats will, however, retain their regular workspaces in the House office buildings.