Rep. Kevin Hern is running for speaker. What are his top priorities?

Rep. Kevin Hern (R-OK) first considered running for speaker after Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) was removed.

But after House Republicans’ second failed attempt at electing a speaker, Hern decided he was the candidate who could bring together a divided House Republican conference.

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The Oklahoma Republican was first elected in 2017 after spending years in the private sector as a McDonald’s franchisee. Now, he’s in his third term in Congress and currently heads the Republican Study Committee, the largest ideological caucus inside the House GOP conference.

This is a huge sell for Hern, who has relationships with members across the ideological spectrum because of his role leading the RSC.

(AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki, File)

“Being the RSC chair, it contains members of Freedom Caucus, members who are Problem Solvers or Republican Governance Group, and Main Street,” Hern said in an interview with the Washington Examiner. “So, all of the different caucuses that probably 95% of all members are engaged in, all except probably two or three, are inside the Republican Study Committee.”

He believes members are looking for “different leadership” than what they’ve previously had and want someone who will lead the conference through engagement, not just telling people what to do. His experience leading employees at his franchises is also something he’s selling. He has said he knows how to listen to people and hear what they want and bring different perspectives to the table.

But, with such a divided conference at the moment, it’s going to be hard to bring people together because tensions are high and trust in one another is low.

So, he wants to listen to the members of the Republican conference and take in their input on how to solve the problems facing the nation, not just be someone who dictates what they’re going to do without input.

“We have to find somebody that actually not only says they can do it,” Hern said. “Now, as we go forward, you got to listen, you got to value, but ultimately, you got to make the decision and move forward based on all the inputs, and that’s what I’ve done my entire life.”

There is also a short time before Nov. 17 when the government is set to shut down, which, if elected, would be one of the first things Hern would have to deal with. His plan, he said, would be to talk with the Rules Committee to try and get the remaining appropriations bills that are already out of committee and try and get those on the floor as quickly as possible; he would then meet with appropriators to see what they need to do in order to get the final two bills out of committee so they can also get on the floor.

But, one of the most important things, he said, is to talk with the Senate and get the Department of Defense appropriations bill into a conference committee and get that passed and signed into law so the military can have adequate funding.

At the same time, he said his near-term priority is for Congress to focus on an aid package to Israel to help them combat Hamas, which invaded just over two weeks ago.

His other goal is to ensure that Congress does its appropriations bills as they were meant to be done. So, he doesn’t want to see an omnibus; he wants to pass a budget and then get each individual appropriations bill through.

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Then, his long-term goal would be to restore trust in Congress by “being respectful of American taxpayer dollars” and ensuring that Congress doesn’t just continue to spend without regard for the taxpayers.

“What we’re doing in Congress right now, if we really wanted to work hard on this because we thought it was going to hurt us personally, we would have had this solved three weeks ago or three months ago, but we think we can keep doing this and nobody really cares. They do care,” Hern said. “It’s important that we get leadership back in Congress and leadership back in America. And that’s why I’m doing this.”