U.S. House Majority Whip Tom Emmer drops out of speaker race hours after nomination

WASHINGTON, Oct. 24 (Xinhua) -- U.S. House Majority Whip Tom Emmer on Tuesday dropped his bid for House speaker, just hours after being nominated by Republicans, becoming the third GOP nominee to withdraw from the race for speaker.

In a closed door vote earlier in the day, Emmer emerged as the third Republican nominee for House speaker, which took five rounds of votes to get to consensus, as several House Republicans recently joined the race.