January 2, 2025
The brand new group of lawmakers you voted for is back to work in Washington DC tomorrow…but things could get messy in the House of Representatives right at the beginning.
Because we’re in for another battle for the speakership.
After the 119th Congress is sworn into the House — the very first order of business is to elect a speaker. Literally nothing – no business – can be conducted in the house until the speaker is elected. It’s true – the current speaker — Mike Johnson – does have an endorsement from president elect Trump but that does not guarantee he’s going to win back the gavel.
To understand why – you have to understand the house makeup. To the math.
We just elected 435 lawmakers to the house of representatives in November. 220 Republicans and 215 Democrats. To have control of the House – you need to have at least 218 seats. Obviously Republicans have secured majority control.
So if everyone is present and voting you will need to have 218 yes votes to pass anything through the house – including electing the next speaker. Well – because Republicans are the majority – they are expected to get the required number of votes from their own party to elect the speaker they want. It is not the minority party’s responsibility to elect the speaker. Sure the minority party could vote for the speaker of the opposing party – but that doesn’t normally happen and frankly – it’s not their job. And on top of that Hakeem Jeffries the Democrat’s minority leader already said no Democrats are going to vote for Mike Johnson – they are pissed about how he handled the government shutdown negotiations last month – I did several videos about it.
So back to the drama we’re expecting tomorrow over this speaker’s gavel. Remember if everyone is present and voting – you need 218 votes to elect the speaker. We already know – these 215 Democrats are a no. So Johnson will need to pull these 218 votes from his membership. But – the Republican majority isn’t really 220 anymore. Why? Because Matt Gaetz resigned his seat so there are actually only 219 Republicans who will be sworn in tomorrow. So if everyone is present and voting Johnson will still need 218 votes to secure a simple majority. That means he can only lose two votes.
Well – he’s already lost one. Republican Thomas Massie from Kentucky – has already said he’s a hard pass on Johnson. And there are about a dozen other house Republicans who are also on the fence. So it is definitely possible that speaker Johnson is going to lose at least one round of speaker votes. Will he lose 15 rounds like we saw with Kevin McCarthy back in 2023? Or will Johnson make some kind of deal with all these Republicans to keep the gavel?
We will have to watch it tomorrow.
