House Speaker Vote
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The Florida Republican, who resigned his House seat during his short-lived bid for attorney general, has publicly flirted with the idea of showing up in Congress on Friday.
Maya C. Miller
Reporting from Washington
As Speaker Mike Johnson labors to lock down enough support to be re-elected to his post, every vote is critical. And there is speculation that former Representative Matt Gaetz, the Florida Republican who engineered the ouster of Mr. Johnson’s predecessor, could play a role in the outcome this time as well.
Mr. Gaetz resigned his seat in December after President-elect Donald J. Trump named him as his choice for attorney general. At the time, Mr. Gaetz said he did not plan to be sworn in to the new Congress, despite having been re-elected to another two-year term days earlier.
But Mr. Trump dropped him from consideration for attorney general amid resistance from Republican senators. There is no legal barrier to Mr. Gaetz showing up unannounced to participate in the speakership election. He flirted with the idea on social media last month.
And on Friday, Mr. Gaetz appeared to hint at some inside knowledge about the outcome, declaring on X that Mr. Johnson would be elected “on the first vote.”
“People might like or dislike that,” Mr. Gaetz wrote. “I’m just reporting the news.”
A representative for One America News Network, where Mr. Gaetz has signed on as an anchor, did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment about his plans.
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