CNN
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House Republicans are at a contentious stalemate over who will serve as the next speaker as Kevin McCarthy vows to continue his increasingly imperiled bid for the gavel. The fight, which began on the first day of the 118th Congress, has thrown the new House GOP majority into chaos and undercut the party’s agenda.

The House is set to convene at noon ET on Wednesday after holding three rounds of votes to elect a speaker on Tuesday. Each time, McCarthy came up short, failing to hit the majority threshold needed to secure the speakership. The House adjourned in the early evening after the vote series stretched on for hours with no resolution in sight.

Now, Republicans are scrambling to find a path forward. McCarthy’s allies say he’s not dropping out and is still prepared to grind this out.

Talks continued Tuesday evening, with McCarthy in his office making calls, sources said. He also has dispatched several emissaries to help find a deal with his foes and present their demands to the rest of the House GOP conference.

It’s possible that the House may adjourn at noon to allow the talks to continue for the rest of the day, according to a GOP source familiar with the matter. That decision has not yet been made. But McCarthy cannot afford to lose more GOP votes on the fourth ballot, something his allies fear will sink his bid.

Rep. Patrick McHenry, a McCarthy emissary, foreshadowed this Tuesday night when he told CNN that more time may be needed.

There needs to be “a clear understanding” about what the offers were made going into Tuesday and “we have to have a wider group of members understand what the trade-offs are, what they look like and the opportunity for the conference to come to terms with getting the 20 on board,” McHenry said, referring to the Republicans who voted against McCarthy on the third ballot Tuesday.

“So this is a this is a longer process of negotiation than just a narrow group, talking to a person,” he added.

The House will continue to be paralyzed until this standoff is resolved.

As the votes stretched on Tuesday, the situation appeared to become even more dire for McCarthy, as the vote count in opposition to his speaker bid grew.

The tally for the first ballot in the speaker vote was 203 for McCarthy, with 19 Republicans voting for other candidates. The tally for the second ballot was 203 votes for McCarthy with 19 votes for GOP Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio. In the third round of voting, there were 202 votes for McCarthy and 20 votes for Jordan, with Rep. Byron Donalds joining the 19 GOP lawmakers who had voted against McCarthy in the first two rounds.

“My vote yesterday was basically to break a deadlock, because we were deadlocked, and we were not getting anywhere,” Donalds, a Florida Republican, said Wednesday on “CNN This Morning.” “Right now, (McCarthy) doesn’t have a pathway to get there. If that reemerges, yeah, I can be there, that’s fine, but what’s necessary now is that Republicans come together and find a way to elect a speaker.”

McCarthy’s failure to lock down the needed votes so far has heightened uncertainty over whether he can win or if a viable candidate could emerge as an alternative. The last time an election for speaker went to multiple ballots was in 1923.

The obstacle for McCarthy is he faces a small but determined contingent of hardline conservatives who have so far been successful in denying him the votes to secure the gavel. The group has used the leverage they have in the razor-thin Republican majority to extract concessions. McCarthy has already given in to a number of their demands, including making it easier to topple the sitting speaker, but so far his effort have not been enough.

The deal-making McCarthy has engaged in to try to win over critics may mean he has a weaker hand to play in his position of authority if he does become speaker.

To be elected speaker, a candidate needs to win a majority of members who vote for a specific person on the House floor. That amounts to 218 votes if no member skips the vote or votes “present.” House Republicans hold 222 seats in the new Congress – so for McCarthy to reach 218, he would only be able to afford to lose four GOP votes.

Former President Donald Trump is watching closely as the dynamic plays out on Capitol Hill and his public support has been a key focus of McCarthy’s efforts.

Two GOP sources familiar with the matter said McCarthy’s allies were panicking on Tuesday after the former president gave a tepid response to NBC News when asked about his support for McCarthy. The former president also declined to issue a statement Monday reiterating his endorsement of McCarthy despite a behind-the-scenes effort from several McCarthy allies to get Trump to do so, two sources said.

One close McCarthy ally then began working behind the scenes to do clean-up duty and started pressing for Trump to put out a statement clarifying his support. McCarthy and Trump then connected by phone, where McCarthy said Trump expressed he was still committed to backing him. Trump put out a strong endorsement on Truth Social Wednesday morning, imploring Republicans not to “TURN A GREAT TRIUMPH INTO A GIANT & EMBARRASSING DEFEAT” and urging them to vote for McCarthy.

Although Trump’s statement might not move the needle among the fiercest McCarthy foes, one of the sources said McCarthy world was worried about looking “weak” and like he was bleeding support, so they felt it was important to reverse the narrative.