Former RNC chair Michael Steele says MTG 'will be the most powerful speaker of the House' if McCarthy wins the speakership, arguing she'll be able to 'control what comes out of Kevin's mouth'

Michael Steele said on Friday that the most powerful speaker of the House would be Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene.

Steele told the hosts of MSNBC's "Morning Joe" that ultraconservative Republican lawmakers would have a lot of sway over a Speaker McCarthy during the next Congress.

Steele said that the GOP response to former President Donald Trump's dinner with two white supremacists was not strong enough.

The leadership of the party with the sort of milquetoast, 'Oh, we don't like antisemitism,' without saying that the antisemitic former president is the case to be made and to draw that very bright line and say: 'This is not who we are, nor I didn't hear it. Steele said that the small fraction of the party still has sway over the leadership.

"Marjorie Taylor Greene will be the most powerful speaker of the House because she will have the ability to control what comes out of Kevin's mouth," he said. The thing is called what it is. It's called shadow. It's the thing, because you can't break that separation when you're dragging her to your events, and you're telling her, "Not only are we going to put you back in the same committee, we're going to give."

The Republicans will likely have a majority in the House of Representatives in January, but only if four more seats are added to the total.

The California lawmaker warned his fellow GOP members that Democrats could choose the speaker if they decided to play games on the House floor.