Republicans may retain control of the House in 2024 despite internal challenges
The GOP House majority is at risk, yet their chances for 2024 seem unaffected by dysfunction. Holding a 1.6-point lead in the generic congressional ballot, they face stiff competition from Democrats. Factors beyond legislative action will sway House control, influenced by the White House race dynamics. Speaker Mike Johnson’s approval ratings suggest a challenging path ahead for Republicans. The Republican Party’s House majority is under threat, but their prospects for 2024 remain steady despite internal challenges. Leading by 1.6 points in the generic congressional ballot, they are in fierce competition with the Democrats. Factors beyond legislative matters will impact House control, guided by the dynamics of the White House race. Speaker Mike Johnson’s approval ratings indicate a tough road ahead for the GOP.
The Republicans’ House majority is teetering on the brink of collapse, but the dysfunction doesn’t appear to have put much of a damper on their 2024 prospects.
Republicans lead in the generic congressional ballot, which measures which party respondents would prefer to see in the majority, by 1.6 points, according to the latest RealClearPolitics polling average.
Two of the three polls taken this month have the two parties tied. The third by Yahoo News has the Democrats leading by 3.
FiveThirtyEight’s polling average is kinder to the Democrats, but not by much. As of Thursday, President Joe Biden’s party leads by just 0.4 points.
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Control of the House will probably come down to other factors besides the current group of House Republicans’ ability to get things done legislatively. One of them will be the race for the White House, where former President Donald Trump has remained competitive with Biden nationally and leads in most of the battleground states despite having problems of his own.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) has increasingly attracted the ire of conservatives inside and outside his conference as he has been unable to muster the votes for their priorities while appearing willing to cooperate with the Democrats on some others. But he isn’t a lightning rod in the way Newt Gingrich once was. Even former Speaker Paul Ryan was featured in ads pushing wheelchair-bound grandmothers off cliffs.
Ryan was associated with entitlement reforms that became top Democratic targets. Gingrich held the biggest Republican megaphone in Washington for the duration of his speakership, upstaging his party’s presidential field. There is no danger of Johnson doing that to Trump.
Johnson’s favorability ratings are underwater by less than eight of the nine major leaders tracked by the RealClearPolitics average. His spread is better than that of former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who was widely considered to be a less polarizing presidential option than other GOP contenders.
That doesn’t mean Johnson is popular. But who is? Johnson’s average favorability rating is 24.3%, while 30.5% view him unfavorably. An Economist-YouGov poll taken this month had those numbers at 29% and 39%, respectively.
Trump, Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) are all viewed unfavorably by majorities of voters. McConnell has a 60.3% unfavorable rating, putting him underwater by nearly 40 points. While he is stepping down from his leadership role, few think his relative unpopularity will make much of a difference as to whether Republicans retake the Senate. A Republican, former Gov. Larry Hogan, is leading in deep-blue Maryland.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), the man who could swipe the gavel if the majority fully self-immolates, isn’t much better off than Johnson. He is viewed favorably by 27.7%, according to RealClearPolitics, and unfavorably by 31%. That’s the best spread anyone has in these averages, but these still aren’t great numbers. Economist-YouGov this month found 28% had a favorable view of Jeffries to 34% unfavorable.
Voters for the most part don’t think much about Johnson or Jeffries at all.
Despite all the House Republican chaos, neither Johnson nor former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy have presided over a true government shutdown. Neither did the United States default before arriving at a deal extending the debt ceiling.
While House Republicans have failed on many fronts, the existence of even a small, tenuous majority has accomplished one thing: it has prevented the consideration of any major new Biden spending programs, even if existing spending cannot be meaningfully cut, or broad-based tax increases.
With persistent inflation, that isn’t good enough for the country. But it might be sufficient to delay any real backlash. Moreover, the majority is so small Republicans can point to their failures and still argue for a bigger majority.
The truth is, not many House seats are competitive. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report, for example, rates 193 seats as solidly Republican and 173 seats as solidly Democratic. Fewer than two dozen are considered true toss-ups.
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None of this is to say that disaster might not lie around the corner for House Republicans. Members are streaming toward the exits, retiring and resigning alike. The ouster of two speakers in one Congress would be a bad look. The process that elected Johnson suggests he has no obvious Republican successor.
But House Republicans haven’t hit rock bottom yet. The country is polarized enough that perhaps they never will. GOP lawmakers seem as likely to give the speakership away as have the voters take it from them.
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