President-elect Donald J. Trump endorsed Speaker Mike Johnson for another term in his post on Mondayvoslot, moving to shore up the fortunes of a leader whose fate he threw into question this month when he sank a bipartisan spending deal Mr. Johnson had struck to avert a government shutdown.
The announcement from Mr. Trump on his website, Truth Social, ended days of private discussions by the president-elect and his allies about whether to try to save Mr. Johnson or find another candidate, as some conservatives have been agitating for. It followed a concerted, monthslong effort by Mr. Johnson to ingratiate himself with the president-elect in hopes of winning his backing and averting another messy fight for the speakership at the start of the 119th Congress on Friday.
But it was not clear whether Mr. Trump’s stamp of approval would guarantee Mr. Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, a smooth road to re-election, given the antipathy he has drawn from some right-wing lawmakers who have recently shown their willingness to buck Mr. Trump. Given the very narrow margin of the incoming House majority, the loss of just a few votes could stymie Mr. Johnson.
One Republican lawmaker, Representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky, has already pledged to oppose him, and others have said their support is not a certainty.
The House is set to choose a speaker as the new Congress convenes, just three days before Mr. Trump’s Electoral College victory is scheduled to be certified by a joint session of Congress. Mr. Johnson must cobble together a majority in the 435-member chamber to keep his job, a feat that his predecessor Kevin McCarthy struggled to accomplish even though he, too, had Mr. Trump’s endorsement at the time.
Failure to have a speaker in place by Jan. 6 could delay the certification process and focus attention on the deep divisions within the narrow House Republican majority. It also could slow what Mr. Trump and G.O.P. leaders had hoped would be a rapid start to legislative business in the new Congress to begin enacting the president-elect’s ambitious agenda.
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In a statement on Thursday, Jim McNamara, an I.L.A. spokesman, called the charge a “publicity stunt” that illustrated that the port employers were “poor negotiating partners.”
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