House Freedom Caucus Chair Mark Meadows: No Plan to Remove Ryan as Speaker

Friday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” House Freedom Caucus chairman Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC) denied there was any plan to replace Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) as Speaker of the House. “I can tell you I’ve had conversations with Steve Bannon, Reince Priebus, both within the last 48 hours or so, and I can tell you that we’re laser focused not on a leadership change, but that we change Washington, DC,” Meadows said. Meadows said he did not feel betrayed by President Donald Trump’s decision to cut a deal with congressional Democrat leaders Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer a day earlier and added he did not think it would set a precedent as far as Trump’s dealings with Congress. He went on to reiterate his claim there was no effort underway to replace Ryan. “I can tell you there’s no plan, there’s nothing there, and I can tell you if I was working on a plan to depose the Speaker you wouldn’t be reading about it in the press,” he told co-host Willie Geist later in the interview. Meadows, however, would not say in a definitively way whether or not if he thought Ryan was “effective” as a House Speaker. “As an