The tech tycoon endorsed Home Speaker Mike Johnson hours after Trump threw his assist behind him.
Tech tycoon Elon Musk endorsed Home Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) to retain the speaker’s gavel on Dec. 30, simply days earlier than members are slated to place the matter to a vote.
“I really feel the identical means!” Musk wrote on his social media platform X, noting that Johnson had his “full assist.”
The endorsement could shock some after Musk voiced his opposition to the now derailed spending deal that Johnson brokered with congressional Democrats earlier this month.
Comprising greater than 1,500 pages, the invoice sought to mix a short-term extension of presidency funding with quite a few different coverage proposals and provisions, together with a pay elevate for members of Congress, whereas not addressing the difficulty of the approaching debt ceiling deadline.
Musk, a Trump ally with a large following on X, urged lawmakers to kill the invoice in a flurry of social media posts.
“Any member of the Home or Senate who votes for this outrageous spending invoice deserves to be voted out in 2 years!” he wrote in a single missive.
After Musk’s opposition, adopted by that of Trump, Johnson and fellow lawmakers scrambled to piece collectively an alternate deal and forestall a authorities shutdown.
In the meantime, Musk’s efforts earned him the reward of Congress’s extra conservative faction, and a number of other lawmakers floated the potential of making him the brand new Home speaker.
“Nothing would disrupt the swamp greater than electing Elon Musk,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) mentioned, noting that the speaker doesn’t must be a member of Congress.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), who has a rocky working relationship with Johnson, likewise mentioned she can be “open to supporting” Musk as speaker.
Musk has already accepted Trump’s provide to guide the brand new cost-cutting advisory physique dubbed Division of Authorities Effectivity, or DOGE, alongside entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy.
Johnson wants the assist of a majority of the Home to win reelection as speaker. When the election takes place on Jan. 3, 219 Republicans and 215 Democrats are anticipated to current, with one emptiness as a result of former Rep. Matt Gaetz’s (R-Fla.) resignation.
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) has already mentioned he is not going to assist Johnson for speaker.
Rep. Victoria Spartz (R-Ind.), in the meantime, mentioned she wants “assurances” that Johnson “received’t promote us out to the swamp.”
“We will need to have a imaginative and prescient and a concrete plan to ship on President Trump’s agenda for the American folks, which I’ve not seen from our present speaker regardless of numerous discussions and public guarantees,” she mentioned.