House Republicans pulled off what some members feared they couldn’t and defended their majority in the 2024 elections — but that slim control appears poised to winnow down to a one-seat majority at the start of next year, potentially hobbling the 47th president’s agenda.
The final House race was called Tuesday in California’s 13th District, where Democratic challenger Adam Gray ousted GOP Rep. John Duarte, and resulted in Democrats flipping a net of one seat this cycle with the GOP clinging to a 220-215 majority, down one from the 118th Congress.
However, at least three reps are set to depart in January.
“The House would have a larger majority but redistricting and gerrymandering in the blue states made that almost impossible to, but we do have a majority and we know how govern with that small majority,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told Fox News on Wednesday.
“We’ve been doing it for a year. We will fill those seats — there will be three vacant, so it will go from 220 to 217, that is razor-thin, but it will only be for a few months.”
President-elect Donald Trump has selected Reps. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) to serve as his US ambassador to the United Nations and Mike Waltz (R-Fla.) as his National Security Adviser. Meanwhile, former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), who resigned last month after being nominated as the next attorney general, a process he later withdrew from, has indicated he isn’t coming back.
No wiggle room
Depending upon how Stefanik and Waltz time their resignations, House Republicans’ majority could tumble to 217–215, a one-seat majority. That’s the narrowest control any party has had of the lower chamber in over a century.
Many observers think Republicans could be forced to deal with a reduced majority until April.
“They’re going to have a very thin margin, so it’s going to be tough,” Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) observed about the other chamber on Tuesday.
That gives Republicans no wiggle room to push their agenda through the House of Representatives, which has historically been home to a rather unruly caucus that feuded bitterly in the past, having jettisoned its leader, former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), last year.
Eventually, the seats held by Stefanik, Waltz and previously Gaetz will be filled and those districts favor the GOP. But at least at the start of the year, when Trump, 78, will enjoy his first 100 days, Republicans will be operating with no margin of error on partisan legislation.
A long to-do list
Another big obstacle heading into the next Congress is that it will inherit time-consuming unfinished business that could prove to be distracting when Trump pursues marquee legislation.
The outgoing 118th Congress hasn’t passed the appropriations needed to fully fund the government for the current fiscal year and is widely expected to punt that into 2025. Congress also hasn’t addressed disaster relief legislation yet.
Budget fights are notoriously brutal in Congress.
“I’m frustrated with the pay-fors not coming forward — not even the attempt,” Rep. Ralph Norman (R-SC) told reporters Wednesday, noting that the House Freedom Caucus met with Johnson, 52, on Tuesday evening. “They are very frustrated with where the dollars are spent.”
Next year, Congress will also have to grapple with another debt ceiling row, the 2017 Trump-championed tax cuts expiring and expanded subsidies for the Affordable Care Act expiring as well.
“I think we’re going to be very busy [at the] beginning of the year,” Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) told reporters Tuesday. “There’s gonna be a ton of work to do.”
The GOP’s game plan
Johnson huddled with Senate Republicans on Tuesday to help brainstorm ideas and chart out a legislative agenda for next year.
Republicans are set to enjoy a somewhat cushy 53-47 seat majority in the upper chamber, though that will dip thanks to Trump tapping Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) to be secretary of state and Vice President-elect JD Vance set to join the administration as well.
Still, in the past, the Senate had often been the hang-up when it comes to pushing through prized, partisan legislation. That’s because of the 60-vote margin needed to overcome a filibuster.
Incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SC) has floated a plan to pass two pieces of legislation using the reconciliation process in which the Senate can wrangle through legislation without overcoming the filibuster if it pertains to the budget.
Specifically, Thune pitched one bill to deal with energy, defense, and the border that Congress will aim to pass around Trump’s first month in office. Then, Republicans would pursue a second bill dealing with taxes later in the year, when their majorities in both chambers firm up.
“John and I were talking as recently as within the last hour about the priority of how we do it and what sequence,” Johnson revealed to Fox News. “The sequence is less important than the idea that we actually put those points on the board and we will. And everybody’s excited.”
Johnson underscored that border security will be a top priority for the next Congress and that Republicans are going to attempt spending cuts.
“We want to take a blowtorch to the regulatory state,” he teased. “”There’ll be lots of ideas that come out. We don’t want to put too many of it out right now, okay, but we are preparing the playbook to unleash and unroll in January.”