Paul Ryan still resisting desperate Republican pleas to become Speaker

Republicans on Sunday continued their frenzied efforts to get Paul Ryan to accept his destiny and become the next Speaker of the House.

Seemingly every Republican congressperson seized on the 2012 vice presidential candidate as the one man who could bring their warring party together after first current speaker John Boehner and then prospective speaker Kevin McCarthy were driven off of the field by the GOP’s more intransigent right flank.

The problem? Paul Ryan really, really does not want to become the next speaker. Why would he? Based on all available evidence, it is the worst job in Washington. You spend your days with the House Freedom Caucus constantly threatening to overthrow you for not defunding Obamacare yet again, and your nights feverishly raising money to get those same people re-elected, and you probably don’t get in your 75 PX-Cross-Ab-Shred-9Z45 workouts a day in either because all your time is being taken up reassuring the freshman congressman from Virginia that you really hate Planned Parenthood as much as you say you do.

That didn’t stop Republicans from fanning out on Sunday to send the message that they really, really wanted Ryan. In the most pointed intervention, Freedom Caucus member Jim Jordan told Fox News that he and his crew would “look favorably” on a Ryan speakership. His positive words were echoed by Republicans on every other Sunday talk show.

CNN caught up with Ryan in his home base of Wisconsin on Sunday. “My answer is still no,” he said. He may not have a choice, though.