Discord inside Donald Trump’s Republican Party has burst into the open in the wake of disappointing off-year election results, with speaker of the House Mike Johnson facing a chorus of protests against his leadership.
A group of Republican congresswomen has attacked Johnson in a rebellion that has rocked the unity and subservience that has defined the response of most of the party’s rank-and-file to the US president’s second-term agenda – and to Johnson as Trump’s faithful ally in Congress.
The infighting points to growing anxiety within the Republican Party about its prospects in the 2026 midterm elections, when members of Congress will have to defend their slim House majority in the face of Trump’s low approval ratings.
“Politicians have a good sense of things that are going on,” said Doug Heye, a long-time Republican strategist and one-time top congressional aide. “These are the animals that are scurrying before the earthquake.”
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Johnson is rapidly becoming a lightning rod for internal criticism and the attacks have been bruising.
Representative Elise Stefanik, of New York, a member of the party leadership who was briefly chosen by Trump to be US ambassador to the UN before he withdrew the nomination, called the speaker a “political novice” and said he lacked the confidence of most House Republicans.
Anna Paulina Luna, a Florida Republican, said she was “frustrated” and annoyed about Johnson’s refusal to hold a vote on a Bill that would require lawmakers and their spouses to sell their stock holdings.
Nancy Mace of South Carolina said she was becoming increasingly impatient on the stock trading ban, as were her voters.
“Conservatives want action NOW, not later, from Congress. [Some] of us have been waiting decades to see Congress fulfil the will of the people. I’m tired of waiting and so too are the American people,” she wrote on X.
The backlash has followed the shock announcement by “Make America Great Again” (Maga) firebrand and Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene that she would step down from Congress in January following a public spat with Trump and frequent disagreements with Johnson.
Her resignation blindsided the speaker, and she added to the pressure on Johnson in support of Stefanik: “As usual from the Speaker, promises made promises broken,” she said.
Johnson, who rose from relative obscurity to become House speaker with Trump’s backing in October 2023, is a political survivor who has kept an often-fractious Republican Congress in line for the past two years.
Earlier this year, he played a pivotal role in shepherding the US president’s signature “one big beautiful Bill” into law.
But he has faced mounting criticism from rank-and-file Republicans in recent weeks on everything from his handling of the federal government shutdown to justice department files relating to the late disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein and whether to extend healthcare tax credits that are due to expire at the end of the year.
Johnson “certainly wouldn’t have the votes to be Speaker if there was a roll-call vote tomorrow”, Stefanik told the Wall Street Journal on Tuesday.
The critiques have morphed into full-throated attacks as concerns grow about the Republicans’ standing in advance of next year’s midterm elections, when control of both chambers of Congress will be up for grabs.
The Real Clear Politics average of the generic congressional ballot – which asks US voters who they plan to vote for in the midterms – shows Democrats with a five-point edge over Republicans.
Greene is one of a number of House Republicans to call it quits in recent weeks. More than two-dozen Republican lawmakers have already left or have said they plan to leave Congress at the end of their term – a number that many in Washington expect to grow in the new year.
Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy – who was dramatically ousted from the position in 2023 at the hands of Greene and others – said on Fox News in a recent interview that he expected others would follow the firebrand Georgia representative’s lead.
“She’s almost like the canary in the coal mine,” McCarthy said.
But Mary Miller, a House Republican from Illinois, played down the infighting and said Johnson had led the chamber with “God-given courage, clarity and remarkable patience”.
“Are there differences among members on some priorities? Of course,” Miller said in a statement on Thursday. “But our mission is bigger than any one individual or headline, and House Republicans must stay united as we work to serve the American people.”
But the party has suffered a string of stinging losses in this year’s off-year elections, including governor’s races in New Jersey and Virginia. Although they held on to a seat in Tennessee last week, the Republican candidate won by just nine points, a significantly narrower margin when Trump won the district by 22 points last year. The trend is expected to continue into next year.
“Many see the writing on the wall,” former Pennsylvania Republican congressman Charlie Dent said. “This is a midterm election, and the party of the president historically takes a drumming.”
Dent said Johnson’s close ties to Trump could weigh on his leadership at a time when the US president’s approval rating was slipping and a small number of Republican lawmakers were becoming increasingly critical of his administration.
“Johnson has completely tied his wagon to the president,” Dent said. “A lot of other members are worried about survival right now, and they are not crazy about some of the things they see happening [in the White House].”
Still, Johnson projected confidence on Capitol Hill, telling reporters on Wednesday: “I’m not worried about my standing at all. We are moving forward with this agenda.”
Asked if he would run for speaker in the next Congress, Johnson replied: “Absolutely.”
– Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2025
