Breaking: After Uncertain Roll Call, Speaker Johnson Wins First Round Ballot as New Congress Gets Off to Rocky Start

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R., La.) was on track to lose reelection during the first round of voting on Friday when Representatives Thomas Massie (R., Ky.), Keith Self (R., Tex.) and Ralph Norman (R., S.C) voted against him during a roll call vote.

But in a turn of events, Norman and Self changed their ballots before the vote closed and threw their support behind Johnson, helping the Louisianan win reelection during the first round of voting at the start of the 119^th Congress.

A half-dozen members who were undecided about Johnson leading up to the first round of counting ended up not responding to the roll-call until the end, when the clerk called on them again and every single one of them voted for Johnson. The theatrical move from this bloc of conservatives — including Representatives Andy Biggs (R., Ariz.), Paul Gosar (R., Ariz.), Michael Cloud (R., Tex.), Andy Harris (R., Md.), Andrew Clyde (R., Ga.), and Chip Roy (R., Tex.) — sent a clear message to Johnson: they will send him a lifeline now, but their allegiance is far from guaranteed later on this Congress if he does not govern in their interest.

Other holdouts begrudgingly voted yes during the first round, with on-the-fence Representative Lauren Boebert (R. Colo.) caveating her vote of confidence with a plea — “Don’t let us down Mr. Speaker.” As expected, every House Democrat backed minority leader Hakeem Jeffries in Friday's roll call vote.

Like many other House Republican members who typically vote the party line, Representative Derrick Van Orden (R., Wis.) were extremely frustrated by his three GOP colleagues who voted against Johnson, as well as the theatrical abstentions-turned-"yes" votes during the first ballot.

"You’re either on the team or you’re not," he told National Review in a brief interview following the first round of counting, arguing that there ought to be "consequences" for this sort of intra-party chaos in the future.

Johnson’s reelection win means that lawmakers can officially kick off the new Congress and certify the election results on January 6.

Friday's first ballot comes after Johnson spent Thursday and Friday morning huddling with undecided members and urging them against kicking off the year with a repeat of January 2023, when former Speaker Kevin McCarthy took multiple rounds to win the gavel. Hardline members have spent recent days pressuring Johnson to agree to a list of demands in exchange for their votes, namely spending cuts and high-profile committee assignments. Some are urging Johnson to give Texas Republican Chip Roy the coveted Rules Committee gavel, which would give the rightmost flank of the conference more control over which bills get to the floor.

In an apparent response to fiscal conservatives' concerns, he pledged in a social media post during Friday morning's quorum call to create a working group of independent experts that will work with House committees and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to implement spending reforms and audit taxpayer spending.

"The national debt is a grave threat to America's economic and national security – and no issue exemplifies the Congress' failures more," Johnson wrote on X. If we want to restore fiscal responsibility, we must start by being transparent about the dollars that are spent, address the issues we find, and then hold those accountable who have misspent funds.

Leading up to Friday's vote, the speaker was of course keenly aware of the backroom deals that helped McCarthy secure the gavel but ultimately led to his undoing – namely his decision to pass a rules package that would change the motion to vacate the speaker to just one member. Nine months later, firebrand former Representative Matt Gaetz (R., Fla.) triggered the motion to vacate the speakership, at which point a united Democratic caucus joined eight Republicans in kicking the California speaker to the curb.

The president-elect also spent the lead-up to Friday's election days calling on-the-fence members personally and urging them to vote the party line and support Johnson. "A win for Mike today will be a big win for the Republican Party," Trump posted on Truth Social earlier Friday, wishing the Louisianan "good luck."

Uneasiness about Johnson's standing among his rightmost flank has been brewing for a while now. After securing the gavel in October 2023, the Louisianan got flak from Massie and Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene in the spring when he muscled a costly foreign aid bill through the chamber. Both hardline members spent the better part of last spring threatening to trigger a snap vote on his speakership but never followed through.

But tensions came to a head before lawmakers went home for the holidays, when disagreements emerged among Republicans over Johnson's handling of government funding negotiations. Fiscal hawks — and Donald Trump — balked at Johnson's attempts to pass a 1,547-page bipartisan government funding bill that was stacked with Democratic sweeteners, prompting him to start negotiations from scratch. His second 116-page legislative attempt failed on the House floor, in part over budget hawks' concerns with a provision that would suspend the debt ceiling for two years – an eleventh-hour addition to the bill Johnson included at the urging of Trump.

Johnson nixed the debt ceiling provision and eventually pushed a government funding bill through the lower chamber, helping congressional leaders and president Joe Biden narrowly avert a shutdown and fund the federal government through mid-March.

And yet over the holidays, a handful of fiscal hawks continued to fan the flames and signal that Johnson's expiration date could come as soon as January 3.

Republicans enter the new year with a trifecta in Washington and an ambitious governing agenda that congressional leaders hope to pass through the budget reconciliation process — including legislation to secure the southern border, unleash American energy, ramp up defense spending, and extend the 2017 Trump tax cuts.

But excitement about delivering on the president-elect's campaign promises is somewhat tempered by this year's razor-thin House GOP majority, and a speaker who can't catch a break.

As NR reported earlier this week, House GOP leaders rang in the new year with a 219–215 majority that is slated to grow slimmer still. Representatives Mike Waltz (R., Fla.) and Elise Stefanik (R., N.Y) are leaving Capitol Hill to take high-profile jobs in the Trump administration, and Representative Matt Gaetz (R., Fla.) has also resigned. Until their seats are filled, House Republican leaders will be left with a 217–215 majority that will seriously test the speaker's negotiating prowess.

Republicans are bracing for lots of uncertainty this Congress. As Representative Mike Lawler (R., N.Y.) put it in an interview with NR before the holidays, "Everybody is going to have to vote for things that they don't necessarily love or might previously have been firmly against because there's going to have to be compromise and negotiation to get across the finish line on major pieces of legislation.”

This story has been updated with breaking news.