Speaker Mike Johnson told his staff on Wednesday morning, November 4, 2026, that he will not run for House minority leader after Republicans lost their majority in the midterm elections. The announcement, reported by Reuters and the New York Post, ends the speakership of a man who took the gavel in October 2023, after the ouster of Kevin McCarthy, and who presided over a narrow and fractious Republican majority for three years. It also opens a contest for the leadership of the House Republican conference that will be decided by a secret ballot on Tuesday, November 10, and that pits two of the most prominent figures in the party, Majority Leader Steve Scalise and Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, against each other for the right to lead a party that has just been swept from power.
Johnson’s decision was not a surprise to those who had watched the final months of his speakership, but it was nonetheless a significant moment. He had, by Reuters’ account, “struggled to maintain control of a narrow 218-214 Republican majority” for three years, a period marked by internal rebellions, narrow votes, and the constant threat of a motion to vacate the chair. The midterm result, in which Democrats were projected to win the House, with some projections putting their majority at its largest since the 257 seats they held in 2008, according to the New York Post, brought that difficult tenure to an end. Johnson will remain Speaker until the new Congress convenes in January 2027, and House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries is in line to become Speaker, according to Nacionale and JNews Network, but the question of who leads the Republicans in the minority is now the most important internal contest in the party.
The race that follows will say a great deal about the direction the Republican Party intends to take after its defeat. Scalise and Jordan represent different styles, different bases of support, and different answers to the question of how a minority party should oppose a Democratic majority. Their contest, and the way it is conducted, will be watched closely by Democrats, by the White House, and by a Republican base that is looking for someone to blame for the loss and someone to lead the recovery. The vote on November 10 is the first formal step in that process, and it will set the tone for the two years that follow.
Mike Johnson Minority Leader: Why The Speaker Stepped Aside
Johnson’s announcement to his staff on the morning of November 4 was brief and, by the accounts that have emerged, matter-of-fact. He would not seek the minority leader’s post. He had won re-election to his own House seat on November 3, in Louisiana’s 4th District, with 58 percent of the vote in a five-candidate field, according to unofficial returns reported by JNews Network, and he is expected to stay in Congress as a rank-and-file member, according to the New York Post. What he would not do is lead the conference in the minority, a role that would have required him to organise opposition to a Democratic Speaker, manage a caucus that had just been reduced to the minority, and carry the political weight of the defeat.
There is an important point of accuracy to observe about Johnson’s service. Sources differ on the number of terms he has served, with some reports describing one figure and others another, and the discrepancy has not been resolved against a single authoritative count. This report therefore does not state a term number, and refers only to the facts that are not in dispute: that Johnson became Speaker in October 2023, after McCarthy’s ouster, that he led a narrow majority for three years, and that he won re-election to his House seat on November 3. Those facts are sufficient to understand the significance of his decision without relying on a figure that remains contested.
Johnson’s tenure as Speaker was defined by the narrowness of his majority. A 218 to 214 edge, as Reuters described it, left him with almost no room for defections, and the conference he led was divided between members who wanted confrontation with Democrats and members who wanted accommodation. He navigated that division for three years, surviving challenges that would have ended other speakerships, but the cost was visible in the difficulty of passing legislation and in the frequency with which the House descended into procedural chaos. The midterm loss, in that context, was not only a defeat for the party but a judgement on the speakership itself, and Johnson’s decision not to seek the minority leadership can be read as an acknowledgement that a new leader is needed for a new phase.
Steve Scalise Jim Jordan Leadership Race: Two Rivals, Two Visions
The two men who plan to run for the post are among the best-known Republicans in the House. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, of Louisiana, and Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, of Ohio, both intend to seek the minority leadership, according to Reuters and the New York Post. Their rivalry is not new. Both ran unsuccessfully for Speaker after McCarthy was ousted in October 2023, and in that contest Scalise beat Jordan 113 to 99 in the conference nominee vote, according to Nacionale and Reuters, before withdrawing and clearing the way for Johnson. The November 10 vote is, in a sense, a rematch, and the history between the two men adds a personal dimension to a contest that is already freighted with political significance.
Jordan moved first in public, announcing his candidacy in a letter to colleagues on Wednesday, November 4, in which he called himself “battle-tested on the oversight front” and argued that the Democrats’ playbook requires a unified minority response, according to the New York Post. The language is characteristic of Jordan, who built his reputation as a combative overseer, using the Judiciary Committee to investigate the Biden administration and to challenge Democratic initiatives. His pitch to the conference is, in essence, that the minority needs a fighter, someone who will use every procedural tool available to obstruct, investigate, and expose the Democratic majority.
Scalise’s pitch, as reported by Reuters, is different in emphasis. He has proposed task forces to hear from people in “Real America” and to craft legislation on Social Security and Medicare, a forward-looking agenda that suggests a leader who wants to build a policy platform for the next election rather than simply oppose the majority. Jordan, by contrast, has emphasised law and order, low taxes, and traditional values, according to Reuters, themes that resonate with the party’s base and that frame the minority’s role as one of defending conservative principles against a Democratic agenda. The difference between the two approaches, one oriented toward policy development and the other toward confrontation and values, is the substantive choice the conference will make on November 10.
House Republicans Leadership Election November 10: How The Vote Works
The internal party leadership elections are expected to take place on Tuesday, November 10, with candidates required to declare by Friday, November 6, according to Reuters and EconoTimes, citing Axios. The timetable is tight, giving the candidates less than a week to make their case to their colleagues, and it reflects the urgency of organising the minority before the new Congress convenes in January. The leader is chosen by secret ballot of House Republicans alone, by a majority of the conference, according to EconoTimes, a process that is internal to the party and that does not involve Democrats or the full House.
The secrecy of the ballot matters, because it frees members to vote their conscience without fear of retribution, and it means that the public endorsements and the private counts may diverge. In the October 2023 contest, the conference vote was close, 113 to 99, and the November 10 vote could be similarly tight. The dynamics of a secret ballot also mean that the candidates’ appeals will be directed at the members themselves, in private conversations and in letters, rather than at the public, and that the outcome may turn on relationships and trust as much as on ideology.
President Trump has told reporters that he will stay out of the Republican leadership election, according to Reuters. That neutrality, if it holds, is significant, because the president’s endorsement has been a powerful force in Republican internal contests in the past. A president who stays out leaves the conference free to choose on its own merits, but it also leaves open the question of whether the eventual winner will have the president’s support in the work of leading the minority. Trump’s decision to stay out may reflect a recognition that the party needs to make its own choice after a defeat, or it may simply reflect the fact that the president has other priorities in the days after the midterms. Either way, the absence of a presidential endorsement makes the November 10 vote a genuinely open contest.
Hakeem Jeffries Speaker 2027: The Majority That Awaits
While Republicans choose their minority leader, the Democrats are preparing to take power. Johnson remains Speaker until the new Congress convenes in January 2027, and House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries is in line to become Speaker, according to Nacionale and JNews Network. Jeffries has already begun the work of organising the majority, writing to his colleagues on November 4 to seek their support for the speakership and setting out first-100-days proposals on Medicaid, food assistance, health-insurance tax credits, tariffs, and Iran, according to reports of his press conference and his letter. His message to the country, delivered on November 4, was that “the American people don’t want us to get even. They want us to get things done”, and that “we ran on affordability. We won on affordability.”
The scale of the Democratic victory, as projected, is considerable. The New York Post reported that Democrats are projected to hold their largest House majority since the 257 seats they won in 2008, a figure that should be treated as a projection rather than a final count, since seat totals were still moving as results were finalised and different outlets reported different numbers. But even allowing for that uncertainty, the direction is clear: the Democratic majority will be substantial, and it will give Jeffries room to govern without the knife-edge arithmetic that defined Johnson’s speakership.
For the Republican minority leader, whoever wins on November 10, the task will be daunting. A large Democratic majority means that the minority’s procedural tools will be limited, and that its influence will depend on its ability to shape public debate, to exploit divisions within the majority, and to build a case for the next election. The leader will also have to manage a conference that is, in the aftermath of a defeat, divided about what went wrong and what should change. The choice between Scalise and Jordan is, in that sense, a choice about how the party wants to conduct its opposition, and it will shape the Republican Party’s identity for the next two years and beyond. The vote on November 10 is the first step, and the whole of Washington will be watching the result.
Sources
USN reviewed reporting from multiple outlets for this story. Read more from New York Post, The Straits Times and EconoTimes.