i m jake tapper in d.c. kevin mccarthy is living on a prayer today is a day a deal will come together. we ll shock you, mccarthy promised reporters last night. so far shockingly no deal. only assurances of some progress. we were told that yesterday, of course, and the day before and the day before. the math today looks nearly identical to the math on tuesday, ballot one, ballot two, 19 rebels, ballot 3, add another rebel to the resistance, four, five, six, a present vote on top of the 20 hard-liners, seven, eight, nine, the math remains the same, more evidence the opposition is dug in. ballots 10 and 11, no show of momentum towards mccarthy. something his allies said he needed to demonstrate then and still needs to demonstrate soon. this farce in the house is also clashing with a deadly and sobering anniversary. lawmakers crowded the capitol steps earlier today to mark two years since the mob emboldened and incited by donald trump s many lies about the election tried to preve
fighting to save damar hamlin s life. and a stunning increase, that is how it is described. that is how the white house is describing the rise in a new covid subvariant. the white house joins us to talk about it. this is what we re watching at this hour. e remain day. in a fight not seen in more than a century and that is not perbo. a century. next hour they will be heading back into that chamber for a fourth straight day of voting and in an exercise that, let s be honest, has become groundhog day. kevin mccarthy has failed on 11 ballots and the path ahead very uncertain. the big difference at this hour is a conference call, all getting on the phone to talk about what kevin has and what he s negotiating and what kevin is going to do. mccarthy is fighting to win over more support, making some extreme concessions to get there. but still right now he doesn t have the numbers to win the gavel. all of this comes on the two-year mark of the insurrection on the capitol. we re goin
premieres sunday, 9:00 p.m. a lot going on today. thanks for watching. i m kate bolduan. all eyes on the floor of the house of representatives, there s a live look inside the chamber right now. our special coverage of the vote for speaker begins right now . in just seconds the house gavels in and stares down the same problem for a fourth straight day to adjourn or to vote again. kevin mccarthy s no good very bad historically awful week has featured 11 straight defeats on the floor, 11 ballots that ended without an election of the speaker of the house of representatives. i m anderson cooper in new york. you re watching live cnn special coverage. you re watching history.