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lite.cnn.com - on gopher - inofficial
ARTICLE VIEW:
What Speaker Johnson’s historically small majority looks like after
Arizona’s special election
By Clare Foran and Annette Choi, CNN
Updated:
11:34 PM EDT, Tue September 23, 2025
Source: CNN
House Democrats will add to their ranks after Adelita Grijalva won
Arizona’s special election on Tuesday.
That will bring the partisan breakdown in the House to 219 Republicans
and 214 Democrats, with two seats still vacant.
With his historically narrow majority, Speaker Mike Johnson can only
lose two Republicans on any party-line vote.
The outcome of the election is also expected to give GOP Rep. Thomas
Massie and Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna the 218 signatures they need to
force on the release of more files related to the Jeffrey Epstein case.
At the start of the 119th Congress, Johnson was already facing the
narrowest House majority in nearly 100 years. The tight margin has
created a major challenge for congressional Republicans as they seek to
enact Trump’s legislative priorities, leaving little room for error.
Republicans won 220 House seats the majority since the outset of the
Great Depression, almost a century ago.
At the start of the new session of Congress, however, the partisan
breakdown stood at 219 to 215, because former GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz of
Florida
Passing a bill in the House requires a majority of all members present
and voting. The magic number is 218 if every member shows up to vote
and all 435 seats are filled, but that can change if there are
vacancies or absences. A tie vote in the House is a fail.
How the House majority ranks in history
The last time a minority in the House held 215 or more seats was after
the 1930 elections, when Republicans won 218 seats, Democrats won 216
and the Farmer-Labor Party won one.
The 72nd Congress — which took place in the early years of the Great
Depression era — officially started in March 1931, but did not
actually convene to conduct legislative business until months later, in
December 1931.
At the official start of that term, in March, the House margin had
narrowed even further — to 217 seats for Republicans to 216 for
Democrats with one seat for the Farmer-Labor party and one vacancy as a
result of the death of one Republican.
In an unusual turn of events, however, the partisan breakdown by the
time Congress convened when a series of additional deaths and ensuing
special elections flipped control of the chamber to Democrats, though
the margin remained narrow.
According to , the 65th Congress had the closest party split in
American history, but in that case, the partisan division was so narrow
that neither party secured an outright majority in the House based on
election results, . As a result, a handful of third-party lawmakers
played a decisive role when the House convened to elect a speaker.
Challenges created by a narrow majority
Johnson won the speakership in a nail-biter of a vote at the start of
the 119th Congress.
The election took place with the majority at 219 to 215, which meant
that Johnson could only lose a single Republican vote if every lawmaker
voted and all Democrats voted against him.
The partisan breakdown in the House has shifted several times since
then as a result of vacancies that have arisen due to lawmaker deaths
and resignations.
Johnson has at times had a bit more breathing room and congressional
Republicans have gone on to pass major legislation – most notably
Trump’s in July – but not without challenges uniting their
conference.
GOP leaders lost two Republican votes on final passage of the tax and
spending cuts bill in the House. Reps. Thomas Massie of Kentucky and
Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania voted alongside Democrats against the
measure.
The next major legislative fight facing Congress will be over
government funding with a shutdown deadline looming at the end of
September.
This story and headline have been updated with additional developments.
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