Republicans look like they will keep the U.S. House of Representatives in their hands in the new year, though once again, a narrow majority is expected to give GOP leaders a hard time.
The Associated Press says the party won 214 House races, which is just short of the 218 needed to take control of the 435-member house. The AP has called 205 seats for Democrats, but 16 seats are still up for grabs as of Tuesday afternoon.
Other news outlets have said that the battle for the House will go to the Republicans, and an expert from the neutral Cook Political Report also sounds pretty sure that will happen.
Erin Covey, editor of Cook’s House, said at an online event on Tuesday put on by the Brookings Institution, a think tank, “At this point, I’m estimating that Republicans will have a 220 to 222-seat majority, which is pretty much the same as their current majority of 221 seats.”
She also talked about the problems that came up when GOP Reps. Elise Stefanik and Mike Waltz got jobs in the Trump administration right after they were re-elected. Stefanik, a congresswoman from New York, has been chosen to be Trump’s ambassador to the UN. Waltz, a congressman from Florida and former Green Beret, has been chosen to be Trump’s national security adviser.
“That could give Republicans an even narrower majority at first while those seats are empty,” Covey said. “It will take a little while for those special elections to be set up to replace those two outgoing Republican members.”
“They will probably be replaced by two more Republicans soon, but for now it will be very hard to run the government,” she said. “Speaker Mike Johnson is running for speakership again and should win, but it will be very hard for him to keep this very small majority together yet again.” That’s how it has been for the past two years, and I don’t think it will change much.
A Hill story citing unnamed sources says that some extreme Republicans are planning to run against Johnson for the gavel in a House GOP election on Wednesday. But Trump said nice things about the speaker last week, and Johnson has said he’s optimistic about his chances.
Even though it’s been a week since Election Day, Covey said it might take the AP and other news outlets longer to call the battle for control of the House.
“It will likely be at least a few more days before we get a final decision on the House majority,” she said. “Democrats technically still have a way out, but they would have to turn around the leads that Republicans have in a number of House races that haven’t been called yet but where Republicans are clearly ahead.”
