Republicans pick Mike Johnson of Louisiana as fourth nominee for speaker

Republicans nominated Rep. Mike Johnson of Louisiana as the party’s fourth nominee for speaker hours after their third GOP nominee was forced to drop out due to lack of support.

Like his three predecessors, Mr. Johnson may also lack enough Republican support to win the gavel in a House floor vote that could come as soon as Wednesday.

Mr. Johnson, the vice chairman of the House Republican Conference,  beat Rep. Byron Donalds of Florida to win the nomination late Tuesday.  

Three other lawmakers were eliminated in earlier ballots.  

It’s not clear how close Mr. Johnson can get to winning the roughly 217 Republican votes necessary to secure the gavel in a floor vote. Mr. Johnson earned 128 votes in a secret GOP ballot. Another 29 lawmakers voted for Mr. Donalds. Many lawmakers were absent from the meeting and were attending an event outside of the Capitol. 

The House GOP voted to nominate Mr. Johnson after Majority Whip Tom Emmer of Minnesota quit the race earlier in the day when he couldn’t unite the conference to back him. 

Mr. Emmer’s nomination lasted about four hours and was ended by two dozen GOP lawmakers who said he was not conservative enough. 

Mr. Emmer, who has a conservative voting record but did not endorse former President Donald Trump in the presidential primary, was kneecapped by Mr. Trump in a social media post. Mr. Trump called Mr. Emmer a Republican in name only, otherwise known as a RINO.  

The Republican nominee will need 217 GOP votes to capture the speaker’s gavel on the House floor, where Democrats plan to vote for their leader, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York.

The GOP’s slim majority means the nominee can only afford to lose four Republican votes. So far, none of the nominees have come close to the number needed to win.

In addition to Mr. Emmer, Republicans have rejected Majority Leader Steve Scalise of Louisiana and Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio. The House has been without a speaker since Oct. 3 when a group of eight hardline conservatives voted with all Democrats to remove Speaker Kevin McCarthy, California Republican.

In the vote Tuesday night, 43 lawmakers voted for Mr. McCarthy as a new proposal gained steam: Reinstating their former speaker with Mr. Jordan elevated to serve as his assistant in something resembling a power-sharing deal. 

Mr. Jordan, a conservative firebrand and Trump favorite, was unable to win about two dozen holdouts, many of them McCarthy backers, when he attempted to win the speaker’s gavel last week. Some lawmakers believe pairing him with Mr. McCarthy may unlock 217 votes needed to finally elect a GOP speaker. 

Rep. Max Miller of Ohio said he’d back the proposal.

“Kevin’s the guy,” he said. “He still has the most support. How many guys in leadership do we have to kneecap?”