Congressman Mike Johnson elected Speaker of the US House of Representatives

10/26/2023 09:12

Early morning on October 26 (Vietnam time), with 220 votes in favor, the US House of Representatives elected Republican Congressman Mike Johnson, representing the state of Louisiana, as Speaker of the House after 3 weeks of the leadership seat being vacant, causing the activities of this legislative body to fall into paralysis.

New US House Speaker Mike Johnson. Photo: AP

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYvCec9W330[/embed]

At the meeting, the Democrats nominated the Minority Leader in the House of Representatives, Congressman Hakeem Jeffries of New York State for the position of Speaker of the House, while all the Republican congressmen who were hesitant on the evening of October 24 decided to vote for Mr. Johnson on October 25.

The vote count showed that candidate Johnson received 220 votes - surpassing the threshold of 217 votes needed to be elected Speaker of the House, while candidate Jeffries only received 209 votes, losing 3 votes compared to the previous rounds of confrontation with other Republican candidates. Thus, Mr. Johnson became the 56th Speaker of the US House of Representatives.

Rep. Johnson, currently Vice Chairman of the House Republican Conference, is the fourth Republican nominee for Speaker of the House after Kevin McCarthy was ousted by the far-right on October 3.

In their first meeting, Republican congressmen chose House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (Louisiana), but he withdrew before the official vote when it became certain that he would not have enough votes.

For the second time, Congressman Jim Jordan (Ohio), Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, after three rounds of voting still did not gain enough support, so the Republican Party had to ignore this candidate.

The third time, the nominee was Tom Emmer (Minnesota), the number 3 Republican in the House of Representatives, but he also had to withdraw just a few hours after being nominated when the far-right faction firmly opposed it, while the second most-voted candidate, Mr. Johnson, was nominated.

Mike Johnson, 51, has been a member of the US House of Representatives since 2016 and is currently serving his fourth term. In 2020, Johnson co-signed with 100 Republican congressmen to support a lawsuit filed by the state of Texas to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in the states of Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, supporting the stance of former President Donald Trump. Johnson was enthusiastically supported by Trump in the race for Speaker of the House.

Johnson's election as Speaker of the House ended a 22-day crisis and opened up the prospect for the US Congress to address urgent issues such as reviewing the $106 billion national security spending package announced by President Joe Biden on October 20 to strengthen US border security, as well as sending billions of dollars in aid to Israel and Ukraine, especially reaching an agreement on a spending package to avoid the risk of a government shutdown as the November 17 deadline approaches.

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