House Speaker Mike Johnson has served in the post for little over a year, but his tenure has been marked with few legislative accomplishments and a series of splits within his conference that stymied his party’s agenda.
His rise to win the gavel was unexpected, and came after three weeks of chaos after the House ousted Speaker Kevin McCarthy last October. Divisions among GOP lawmakers made it hard to coalesce around a replacement, but Johnson rose to the top after other party leaders failed to gain enough support.
Once he took office he faced criticism for doing what got McCarthy booted from the job — working with Democrats to pass a spending deal to avoid a government shutdown. Groups of far-right members frequently worked together to block GOP leaders’ own bills and Johnson faced a threat from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene to remove him.
Earlier this fall Johnson offered reporters a blunt assessment of his job: “by all admission this has been one of the most complicated speakerships in the history of Congress.”
Despite those challenges, Johnson earned praise from his colleagues for his quick work to raise money and campaign across the country to keep the GOP majority. In the month of October he traveled to 65 cities in 24 states.
Johnson, 52, a religious conservative and attorney, served on the House Judiciary Committee and authored a legal brief to challenge the 2020 electoral count. Since becoming speaker he has touted his close relationship with Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, and that support has been critical for Johnson warding off attacks from the GOP base and some of his own colleagues.
Johnson says border security is his top agenda item, followed by an effort to renew the 2017 tax cuts that will expire at the end of 2025. He also suggested the week before Election day that Republicans planned to reform the Affordable Care Act–something Trump later rejected. Johnson later told CNN that his agenda did not include repealing the popular health care law.
Johnson has won his race for another term, according to AP. See House results from the AP here.
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