Kevin McCarthy is still super bitter about losing his job

Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy couldn't help but take a shot at former Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida, while defending Republican gerrymandering tactics, claiming his tenure as speaker was successful until he ran afoul of an immoral Gaetz.

“When I was in, we won five [California] seats. We lost two in the last cycle. I didn't lose my job because I worked across the aisle,” McCarthy told CNN on Thursday. “I lost my job because one person slept with an underage woman, and I wasn't going to do something different when it came to the ethics committee.”

McCarthy has repeatedly pointed to his unwillingness to stymie a House Committee Ethics investigation into Gaetz’s alleged sex and drug misconduct as the reason for his ouster as speaker.

Gaetz leveraged a “motion to vacate” rule, which allowed a single member of Congress to force a vote with a simple majority, ultimately pushing McCarthy out of leadership. House Republicans amended the rule in January in order to protect current Speaker Mike Johnson from a similar fate.

Since then, McCarthy has been vocal in his criticisms of Gaetz, championing efforts to remove him from office. McCarthy’s fall from leadership did not save Gaetz, however. The threat of the ethics probe’s findings may have been the final nail in Gaetz’s political coffin, as the Florida man withdrew his name from consideration for U.S. attorney general shortly after being tapped for the position by President Donald Trump.