House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) appears to be on the brink of losing his gavel when the next Congress is sworn in next month.
Donald Trump and Elon Musk killed a bipartisan government funding bill Wednesday, and Johnson has seemingly lost the support of many Republicans to hold onto his job, which senators Rand Paul (R-KY) and Mike Lee (R-UT) suggested should go to Musk, the South Africa-born tech billionaire who the president-elect tapped to slash trillions from the federal budget.
"The fact that Mike Lee and, for example, Marjorie Taylor Greene also are floating other people for speaker, including Elon Musk, is a reflection of their discontent with speaker Johnson, and that's the significant part here," said The Hill's Mychael Schnell. "The House is going to gather in the chamber on Jan. 3 to select the next speaker of the House, and while Mike Johnson was unanimously nominated by his conference last month for the gavel, his grip on that looks extremely tenuous right now."
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"There's at least one Republican, Tom Massie, who's already saying he will not support Johnson on Jan. 3," Schnell continued. "I've spoken to a number of others who say they are uncertain, and they are very upset with how speaker Johnson is currently handling the spending deal. Talking about Marjorie Taylor Greene for a second, she was somebody who led the motion to vacate against Johnson earlier this year, then ultimately said she would support him. The fact that she is now floating somebody else shows how deep this discontent is with the Republican conference, and it is a worrying sign for Mike Johnson as he heads into the speaker vote next month."
"I will note the whole conversation in the lead up to this spending fight was Republicans were saying, we are watching so closely to see how Mike Johnson handles this, this will determine if we can support him in January," Schnell added. "Right now, it's not going well for him."
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