After a plain preponderance of 218 Republicans finally decided to vote in his favour, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., was reelected as speaker for the 119th Congress on Friday evening.
Johnson’s campaign trail to election was turbulent because some Republicans have criticized him for buckling down to Democrats and upholding the status quo in a House with several people in power.
The Christmas spending battle was the latest example of the top-down approach, where a Democrat- and Republican-leadership-negotiated” going quality” ( which was really a 1, 547-page bus with major prizes to Democrats ) angered many in the Republican conference.
While Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., said earlier on that he would not help Johnson for speech on Friday, nine Republican remained holdouts until the very end of the first vote. Two people, Reps. Ralph Norman, R-S. C., and Keith Self, R-Texas, were the last two seats to move, putting Johnson over the top.
The two officially received a phone call from President-elect Donald Trump to urge them to switch their seats.
Given the razor-thin percentage that Republicans hold, nine members of a infamously cynical majority group are more than enough to stifle policy. In the past, Johnson has used Democrats to replace traditional Republican foes. He has been subjected to severe condemnation from his party’s more traditionalist supporters because he has vehemently worked with Democrats rather than listening to their problems.
The nine holdouts may have been trying to contact Johnson, since that is how many Republicans would be required to move ahead with a motion to remove the speaker from the proposed rules offer for the new Congress, which could lead to his ouster.
Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, who has been a writer of Johnson’s, signaled that the path ahead for the Democratic majority could be steep. While finally voting in favor of Johnson, he said,” There are many people beyond the three who voted for someone else who have doubts”.
In what resembles a require letter to command, Roy and ten House Freedom Caucus associates joined. The email included a list of concessions that they believe Johnson does have made, including changing the schedule so that the House did “work at least as difficult as the Senate,” which would include holding sessions five times a week for the first ten days of the new Congress.
Additionally, they hoped that Johnson would promise to stop spending on peace costs. Additionally, the group claimed that Johnson should make it clear that members of Congress you propose amendments and that bills that pass the House floors do not violate the 72-hour rule that mandates members have 72 hours to learn and question a expenses before it is put up for a vote. Additionally, the group desired claims that Johnson wouldn’t “rely strongly on Democrat support for passage” of legislation.
” Speaker Johnson may prove he did not fail to implement President Trump’s strong agenda”, the notice continued. The Republican party demanded that Congress stabilize the frontier, reduce inflationary spending, and change a number of Biden-Harris policies, including those requiring electric vehicles and subsidizing “unhealthy foods in the meals stamp program.” In contrast, the House Freedom Caucus members called for some election integrity measures like “ensuring just citizens you vote, requiring voting recognition, enforcing same-day voting”, and vote security. Additionally, they urged that “members of Congress stop trading stocks.”
In his opening speech as speaker, Johnson touted an” Americans first” agenda, pledging to cull the” totalitarian” bureaucracy, restore parental rights in education, “deport dangerous, criminal illegal aliens”, finish the border wall, and restore the military, which, under President Joe Biden, “replace]d ] our military warriors with social justice warriors”, Johnson said.
Breccan F. Thies is an votes journalist for The Federalist. He formerly covered problems of education and culture for Breitbart News and the Washington Examiner. He is a Publius Fellow at the 2022 Claremont Institute and holds a degree from the University of Virginia. You may pursue him on X: @BreccanFThies.
