Even with Trump’s endorsement, Johnson’s speakership is far from secure

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R., La., faces a difficult path toward retaining the speaker’s gavel in the next Congress, even with President-elect Donald Trump’s endorsement.

When the House votes on Friday, lawmakers will hold a formal contest in which the prospective leader must secure a majority of votes to lead the chamber. That process is likely to give irate conservatives an opportunity to keep the Louisiana Republican from returning to the top job.

The House elections returned a narrow Republican majority, which will temporarily shrink as Trump has tapped members of the lower chamber to serve in his administration. In early 2023, Kevin McCarthy, then the Republican leader, struggled to claim the gavel as roughly 20 Republicans sought to extract budgetary concessions from him. McCarthy ultimately lost the post when roughly half a dozen Republicans voted with Democrats to boot him from the job.

Republicans won 220 seats in the 2024 House elections, compared to the 215 that went for the Democrats. Former Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., left Congress after Trump named him as his pick for attorney general, though he later withdrew himself from consideration. His seat will not be filled by the time of the leadership contest. At least some journalists, however, have raised questions as to whether Gaetz may yet take the oath of office to vote this week as he was elected to the next Congress.

Trump: "Complete & Total Endorsement"

Johnson will face a narrower majority than McCarthy did two years prior, and, arguably, a more frustrated bloc of budget hawks. Johnson only claimed the gavel after several other Republicans failed to win the support of the disparate wings of the conference. But Trump’s endorsement could prove a boon to him as he seeks to unify Republicans.

"Speaker Mike Johnson is a good, hard working, religious man. He will do the right thing, and we will continue to WIN. Mike has my Complete & Total Endorsement. MAGA!!!" Trump posted on Truth Social.

That endorsement seems to have one over at least one member of the anti-McCarthy bloc that brought down Johnson’s predecessor.

“Trump endorsing Johnson is ‘art of the deal’ level practicality. We could never have held up McCarthy two years ago for concessions if a Trump certification hung in the balance,” Gaetz posted. “Now, it does. We were able to hold up McCarthy because Republican voters weren’t all that eager to see us getting back to being Biden’s bitch (which Kevin ultimately did anyway). The resistance to [Johnson] is now futile. Let’s work to make him the best version of himself (which was more like the 2023 vintage of Mike).”

Unfortunately for Johnson, Gaetz’s ability to vote at all appears unlikely.

Other dissidents, however, have suggested they will not support Johnson, with Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Victoria Sparz, R-Ind., among the most prominent of his critics.

“I respect and support President Trump, but his endorsement of Mike Johnson is going to work out about as well as his endorsement of Speaker Paul Ryan,” Massie posted on X. “We’ve seen Johnson partner with the democrats to send money to Ukraine, authorize spying on Americans, and blow the budget.”

“Mike Johnson is the next Paul Ryan. On January 3rd, 2025, I won’t be voting for Mike Johnson. I hope my colleague will join me because history will not give America another ‘do-over,’” he added.

“There are a lot of other people who are interested,” Spartz said Monday on “Fox and Friends.” “He didn’t deliver for President Trump, too, what he promised just recently.”

“He needs to be able to convince the American people that he is able to do it,” she added.

Johnson, for his part, thanked Trump for his endorsement, saying he was “honored and humbled by your support, as always. Together, we will quickly deliver on your America First agenda and usher in the new golden age of America.”

Holding their cards close

Many more lawmakers, including several members of the group initially opposed to McCarthy, have yet to comment on their plans to support or oppose Johnson. With the vote set for Friday, Johnson has little time to win over his skeptics and recent events have shown that Trump’s word may not be sufficient to placate Johnson’s opponents.

The end-of-year budget negotiations that culminated with the passage of a short-term continuing resolution followed intense public opposition to an originally-planned bill that included considerable pork spending and Democratic agenda items.

Trump intervened and demanded that lawmakers instead pass a clean bill and raise the debt limit to help him avoid a tense congressional showdown early in his term. While the legislature did eliminate the pork spending, for the most part, they failed to address Trump’s request to raise the debt limit, largely due to opposition from lawmakers currently questioning Johnson.

Though some in the Trump camp celebrated the passage of the stripped down bill as a victory, the incident nonetheless highlighted that, in a narrowly divided lower chamber, individual members have greater influence and more than a handful have been willing to go against Trump’s preferences.