Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.) was elected as the new House Speaker Wednesday to fill the vacancy after three weeks.
Johnson won the Speaker’s gavel in a 220-209 vote over Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.). Every Democrat supported Jeffries while every Republican backed Johnson.
However, the unity within the Republican conference may not last as the Nov. 17 deadline to fund the government approaches. Previous Speaker Kevin McCarthy was ousted after working with Democrats to pass a resolution to keep the government open last month.
Johnson’s election will allow the House to finally resume business after three weeks of chaos and dysfunction.
However, Democrats have made it clear that they will use Johnson’s record against vulnerable Republicans in the elections next year.
Johnson is an election denier who was instrumental in the effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election in Congress. He sent an email from a personal email account in 2020 to every House Republican soliciting signatures for an amicus brief for a Texas lawsuit seeking to invalidate electoral college votes from key swing states then-President elect Joe Biden won.
Johnson also has a long history of opposing abortion rights which has earned him an “A+” rating from Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America. He has endorsed a bill that would ban abortion nationally after 15 weeks, with exceptions for rape, incest, and the life of the mother.
He also opposes LGBTQ rights. Earlier this year he voted against bipartisan legislation to codify same-sex marriage. Johnson has also authored legislation called the Stop the Sexualization of Children Act of 2022, which “prohibits the use of federal funds to develop, implement, facilitate, or fund any sexually-oriented program, event, or literature for children under the age of 10,” his office said, according to NBC News.
