The House of Representatives did not have a speaker for 21 days 21 hours 9 minutes and 2 seconds. After three different candidates for the position, House Republicans finally agreed upon Mike Johnson as Speaker with all 220 Republicans voting for Johnson and 209 Democrats voting for Hakeem Jeffries, the minority leader.
Within the last 3 weeks, America has been through an unprecedented series of events. It all started with Representative Matt Gaetz, R-Fl, motioning to vacate against former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-CA. Although there were a variety of reasons for Gaetz’s motion, it allowed Democrats to work with a slim minority of far-right Republicans to remove Kevin McCarthy from the speakership. When Johnson became Speaker, it officially ended the longest time in US history where the House of Representatives didn’t have a Speaker of the House.
The new Speaker, Mike Johnson, was elected to Congress in 2016 from Louisiana. Despite his lack of experience in House leadership, he has been gaining leadership positions as the chair of multiple committees in Congress. His stance on the major hot-button issues are that he opposes abortion, is against same-sex marriage and he denies the 2020 election results.
With three weeks of a non-functioning House of Representatives, Mike Johnson has much to do. He has to address the approaching potential government shutdown by the November 17th deadline, figure out funding for foreign conflicts such as the conflict in Ukraine and the conflict in Israel and the Gaza strip. “The people’s House is back in business,” Johnson said.
