House Republicans brace for losses — and a leadership fight

One of the people with the most to win or lose next week is House Speaker Mike Johnson. Recent days, he said he's optimistic about the Republicans' chances of holding on to the House and him keeping the gavel. So let's talk about that and more. Reese Gorman from the Washington Sun up late with me tonight here on The Final Five. Good to see you, my friend. Thanks for having me on, Jeff. All right, talk to me here. You have had a great, it seemed a great working relationship with the Speaker. You've covered him extensively. You're going to be with him next week. What are you hearing on the Hill and what's going to be the Are Republicans as optimistic as the speaker puts himself out to be? No, not at all. Not in the slightest. Mike Johnson is definitely the most optimistic person right now about it. He doesn't let anything on privately to us. He kind of remains extremely optimistic. That's fantastic. But his colleagues and other people kind of around him are very pessimistic. They believe that they will be in the minority. Thank It's not if, it's when, and by how much. And so people are not as optimistic as the speaker is right now. And yeah, I mean, to your point, he has the most to lose. I mean, his leadership life is on the line. I mean, he will, as he said, he expects people to ask him to run for minority leader. My reporting proves that that's very likely, like, you. People don't necessarily want him to run for minority leader. It does not appear that even if he were to run, which I think is likely, just based on reporting, it wouldn't necessarily prove that great for him. I do not believe from my conversations that there's an appetite to keep him on as minority leader. So he does have a significant amount to lose. But it's not for a lack of trying. He is barnstorming the country right now, really trying to pull Republicans over the finish line. But unlike the previous Republican speakers that we've seen, you don't have Large members of the Republican conference saying that, or at least they're not outwardly saying, if we lose seats, it is Johnson's fault. It seems as though they're not pointing the fingers directly at him with the potential of losing the majority on the line, or are they? Some people are, but I think that this goes deeper. I think this is different because this is a thing that a lot of people blame Trump for. They blame Trump for getting into Iran. They blame Trump for kind of all this grift that they're seeing happening. That is a big issue with voters. They were seeing kind of be reported out in the past couple of weeks. So, yeah, you're seeing that this is a lot of issues that people are taking with the president, not necessarily with House Speaker Johnson running the House. So as we look forward, look ahead to next week, I know that we've seen all sorts of projections about how many seats could be won by one side lost by the other. What does it come down to? Are there gonna be any, is there a potential for anything that would change these fortunes in the next couple of days or with early voting? Are their fates locked in? Most Republicans that I talk to believe that they're going to be in the minority, and that's just the reality of it. I think that's just kind of midterms. That's how midterms go. That's how midterms have historically gone. And that's what a lot of people suspect, is that they're going to be in the minority. Now, you have different kind of predictions on how deep in the minority they're going to be, but ultimately they believe that they will be in the minority come November 3rd. Are you hearing any names, any potential challenges to Johnson's leadership if he decides to run for minority leader? Yes, for sure. I mean, I've been reporting on the fact that House Majority Leader Steve Scalise has intentions on running for minority leader. House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan also has kind of plans to run for minority leader as well. So I think you will see probably a three-way race. For this position, and it will be Jordan vs. Scalise vs. Johnson, which is just gonna be a bloodbath. It's gonna be a brutal, brutal race. They'll have less than a week to run it and kind of gear up for it. And it's gonna be a sprint and a really tough battle for all three involved. So this is not like the Democrats after they lost the majority and they sort of paved the way for Nancy Pelosi to become minority leader, right? No, no, not at all. This is the exact opposite, actually. There's going to be just a brutal fight between the three. All right, Reece Gorman joining us tonight from the Washington Sun. Good to see you, as always. Thanks, Jim. Appreciate you. We're back after this.