Donald Trump decided the fate of the Speaker of the House of Representatives

Republicans almost unanimously (220 out of 221 members of the House from the party) voted for the candidacy of Congressman Mike Johnson and elected him Speaker of the House of Representatives. This important post in the American political system has been empty since October 3, when far-right Republicans forced the resignation of their fellow party member Kevin McCarthy from this position.

Johnson’s election came with the support of former President Donald Trump. He congratulated Johnson, adding that he “will be a great speaker.” “Trump chose this guy as speaker so that he would carry out his will, and not work for the interests of the country,” writes American journalist Francis Wilkinson. On October 24, the former president criticized newly elected Republican speaker candidate Tom Emmer and accused him of lacking loyalty to himself and the Republican electorate. Hours after winning the nomination race, Emmer announced he was withdrawing his candidacy.

Trump’s critics on both sides of the political spectrum argue that he remains a ballast for the Republican Party’s path to victory. One example is the congressional midterm elections in 2022. Since 1946, the president’s party has regularly lost its majority in the House of Representatives in midterm elections. On average, the president’s party loses 25 seats.

In 2010, during the presidency of Barack Obama (2009–2017), Republicans gained 63 seats. In 2018, during the Trump presidency, midterm Democrats expanded their hold by 41 seats. In 2022, under Biden, Republicans were able to take only nine House seats from Democrats. Many American experts and even some Republican Party functionaries blamed Trump for this. Trump’s opponents argue that he will not only lose to Biden in the 2024 presidential and congressional elections, but will also deprive Republicans of even a slim majority in the House.

During his presidency, Trump (2017–2021) managed to make the party as loyal to himself as possible. From January 2017 to January 2021, according to FivThirtyEight (owned by ABC News), of the 293 Republicans elected to Congress (both the Senate and the House of Representatives) in 2016, 119 left their seats – or… for confrontation with Trump, or because of disagreement with his actions, or failed to get re-elected.

An example of a situation is the loss of former Vice President Dick Cheney’s daughter Liz Cheney in the 2022 congressional primaries. After the storming of the Capitol, she became one of Trump’s main critics. He did not forget about this and chose her competitor, who received 63,709 more votes than Cheney.

Between January 2021 and the November 2022 midterm elections, Trump expressed support for 244 candidates during the primaries, according to Ballotopedia. Of these, 227 won the party nomination (93.03%). The results of the YouGov poll, conducted from October 21 to 24, show that 81% of Republican voters surveyed have a favorable view of Trump.

The election of the speaker should not be associated with the real electoral process; it is a purely bureaucratic and party story that few will remember in 2024, so it does not allow us to assess Trump’s chances as a presidential candidate, says Pavel Dubravsky, head of Dubravsky Consulting. The political strategist believes that Trump is ballast for the Republican Party in terms of its long-term prospects. “But in the confrontation with Biden, Trump serves as a powerful battering ram for the party against the Democratic Party. And the perception among the electorate is also changing, Trump is again an anti-establishment candidate, as was the case in 2016. Therefore, sociology gives him an advantage over Biden, although not a huge one,” says Dubravsky.

In an era of high levels of political polarization, Trump’s figure is more likely to be advantageous for Republicans, says Alexey Naumov, an expert at the Russian International Affairs Council. “He is becoming more popular not only than his competitors within the party, but also more popular than Biden. On the other hand, the Republicans have no alternative,” the political scientist explained. Naumov clarified that one of Trump’s advantages remains his ability, unlike other Republicans, to most effectively motivate the party electorate.