The Political Polarization and Bitter Infighting between the 2 US Parties Is Becoming Increasingly More Obvious

On Oct. 12, the leader of the majority party in the U.S. House of Representatives, Steve Scalise, withdrew from the election for House when he failed to get sufficient fom Republican Party members. On Oct. 13, Jim Jordan, who had previously lost the race within the party, announced that he would continue to run for speaker. According to the latest news, he won the party's nomination that same afternoon. Earlier this month, former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, was ousted, and the House scheduled a vote to replace him on Oct. 11. But, ongoing polarization within the Republican Party has left the House in a state of paralysis as it remains unable to choose a speaker.

Some experts say the current chaos in the House reflects the increasingly obvious political polarization caused by partisan rivalry in the United States. Internal rifts and divisions within the Republican Party have made the chaos worse. It currently looks as if no political party in the United States can form a strong enough alliance to maintain stability within Congress. The disruption in the House is expected to continue into the future.

Wang Hao of the Center for American Studies at Fudan University has observed that “First and foremost, the main and well-known issue is the increasing polarization between the Democratic and Republican parties in the U.S. Both parties are becoming more and more entrenched in their vicious battles with each other. For example, we saw in a recent vote in the House of Representatives, the Democratic Party overwhelmingly supported the removal of the Republican Speaker McCarthy. This illustrates that the Democratic Party’s votes, actions and political positions are not about right or wrong, but about party affiliation. That's because McCarthy, in reality, was seeking compromise between the two parties, which disturbed the Republican Party and led to his removal. In such a situation, the rational approach for Democrats would have been to support McCarthy. However, we can see that the Democratic Party members in the House of Representatives are not doing that.”

Internal Polarization in the Republican Party Is Exacerbating the Chaos

Wang further notes that "[L]ooking through the chaos, we can see that, in addition to the deepening polarization between the Democratic and Republican parties, there is also significant internal division within the Republican Party. Because we know that at the beginning it was Republican Party lawmakers, not Democrats, who moved to unseat McCarthy. That’s to say, a very small number of so-called far-right populists or extreme hard-liners within the Republican Party were very dissatisfied with McCarthy's approach of seeking cooperation or compromise with the Democrats. This suggests that their identification with this small group transcends party affiliation and is why they proposed ousting the speaker from their own party.”

Currently, No Party Can Form a Majority Political Coalition

Wang continues by saying that “The third point we need to pay attention to is that a very prominent feature of the current U.S. political landscape is that no political party can form a strong enough majority alliance. This has magnified the political influence of an extreme minority, the far-right group within the Republican Party, leading them to become a decisive force in tipping the political balance.”

The Chaos in the House Will Continue

Wang concludes that "this state of affairs means that going forward, will the Republican Party’s new candidate be able to meet the political demands of the far-right populists and can they effectively and consistently play the role of speaker of the House of Representatives? I think it’s very uncertain. In the longer term, the chaotic situation within the House of Representatives, characterized by the polarization between parties as well as internal divisions, will continue at least until the 2024 elections.”