Speaker-designate Mike Johnson, R-La., was re-elected to lead the House of Representatives on Friday.

The Louisiana Republican won along party lines during the first round of voting, a stark contrast to his predecessor’s drawn-out, 15-round battle in 2023.

It comes despite saber-rattling by some conservatives who threatened to withhold support from Johnson in protest of his handling of government funding and several other issues in the 118th Congress.

Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., who was part of an unsuccessful push to oust Johnson last year, was the speaker-designate’s most vocal critic leading up to the Friday vote.

He told former Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., on his new One America News Network program, ‘You can pull all my fingernails out, you can shove bamboo up in them, you can start cutting off my fingers.’

‘I am not voting for Mike Johnson tomorrow, and you can take that to the bank,’ Massie said. 

Other detractors included members of the House Freedom Caucus like Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, who has expressed interest in chairing the influential House Rules Committee, the panel that directs terms for House-wide votes on legislation.

Johnson’s allies warned in return that a prolonged House Speaker fight could delay Congress’ joint session to certify President-elect Donald Trump’s victory, slated for Jan. 6.

Johnson also had a key backer in Trump, who emphasized his support for the GOP leader hours before the midday vote.

‘Good luck today for Speaker Mike Johnson, a fine man of great ability, who is very close to having 100% support. A win for Mike today will be a big win for the Republican Party, and yet another acknowledgment of our 129 year most consequential Presidential Election!!’ Trump wrote on his Truth Social app.

Johnson wrote on X in response, ‘Thank you, President Trump! Today is a new day in America. Congressional Republicans must stay united to quickly deliver President Trump’s America First agenda. Let’s get it done.’

His victory marks the start of his first full term as speaker. Johnson won the gavel in October 2023 after three weeks of closed-door talks following the ouster of ex-Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif.

U.S. Virgin Islands Delegate Stacey Plaskett protested the nonvoting status of the Virgin Islands and other U.S. territories Friday— sparking mixed reactions after she accused the U.S. in House floor remarks of having a ‘colonies problem.’

The exchange occurred after Plaskett, a Democrat, stood after the first roll call vote to note what she said was a parliamentary inquiry.

Plaskett then asked the House clerk why she and other delegates from the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and the District of Columbia were not asked to participate in the House speaker vote.

Combined, she noted that the delegates excluded represent some four million Americans and what she said was ‘the largest per capita of veterans in this country.’

Speaking over Republican cries of ‘order!’ that could be heard in the background, the House clerk then explained to Plaskett that delegates-elect and the resident commissioner-elect are not qualified to vote in the House speaker election.

‘Representatives-elect are the only individuals qualified to vote in the election of a speaker, as provided in Section 36 of the House Rules and Manual,’ the clerk said.

That response prompted an impassioned response from Plaskett. ‘This body, and this nation, has a territories and a colonies problem,’ she said, prompting some Democrats to give a standing ovation.

Republicans, for their part, began booing.

‘What was supposed to be temporary has now effectively become permanent,’ she said. ‘We must do something about this problem.’

Her mic appeared to have been cut off shortly thereafter.

Plaskett has served as a non-voting delegate to the U.S. Virgin Islands since 2015, during which time the chamber has voted to elect seven separate House speakers. 

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., narrowly held onto the gavel in a nail-biter vote on Friday afternoon. 

Republicans eager to swear in President-elect Trump later this month and capitalize on their control of the House, Senate and White House avoided the same fate of the past two drawn-out speaker elections. 

After some wrangling by both Trump and Johnson, ultimately Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., was the lone Republican to defy leadership and vote against Johnson. 

Here’s a look at the top moments of the first vote of the 119th Congress:

1. Five Republicans refuse to vote; three vote against Johnson

Johnson appeared to be on a path to defeat when five Republicans sat silently as their clerk called their names for a vote. Three others — Republican Reps. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, Ralph Norman of South Carolina and Keith Self of Texas — voted against Johnson. 

Massie voted for House Whip Tom Emmer, R-Minn.; Norman voted for Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio; and Self voted for Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla. 

At the end of the vote, the names of those who refused to vote on first mention were called again. Reps. Andy Harris, R-Md.; Andy Biggs, R-Ariz.; Andrew Clyde, R-Ga.; Michael Cloud, R-Texas; and Chip Roy, R-Texas, ultimately voted for Johnson. 

2. Trump calls two GOP defectors 

Trump then got on the phone with both Norman and Self and urged them to switch their vote for Johnson, both congressmen confirmed to Fox News Digital. 

Two people who spoke with Fox News Digital said Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., connected Trump with Self and Norman by phone after they voted against Johnson.

Mace would not comment, but Fox News Digital saw her and Johnson share a hug on the House floor after they and others were in the side room with the holdouts.

Mace was also seen in intense talks with Norman off the House floor earlier.

Massie was irreconcilable — he’d long had his mind made up that Johnson was not the right person for the job. But Johnson could only afford to lose one vote and hold on to the gavel.

Johnson, too, huddled with Self and Norman. House leaders did not formally end the vote while figuring out a path forward.

3. Self and Norman change their vote 

About an hour after voting for others, the pair of defectors switched their votes, granting Johnson his wish. 

Self said he switched his vote in order to help further ‘the Trump agenda.’ 

‘The Trump agenda is most important. Trump agenda is most important, and we need to shore up processes in the House to make sure we have the strongest negotiating team for the reconciliation package that will come. So again, this was all about making the Trump agenda more successful,’ said Self. 

Norman said he spoke with Trump, but was ultimately persuaded to change his mind due to the promises he got from Johnson to make ‘real change.’ 

Trump ‘just made his point about how Mike is the only one who could get elected,’ Norman said. 

He said Johnson didn’t offer him a quid pro quo but ‘a commitment that things are going to change.’ 

Fox News’ Liz Elkind contributed to this report. 

President-elect Trump appears to have helped Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., avoid a messy, drawn-out fight to lead the House of Representatives.

Trump spoke by phone with both Reps. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., and Keith Self, R-Texas, after they had initially voted for people other than Johnson for speaker, two knowledgeable sources told Fox News Digital.

Self and Norman were seen disappearing into a side room with Johnson and others after the roll call vote was complete, but before the vote was formally closed. 

They emerged minutes later and announced they would both vote for Johnson – cementing the Louisiana Republican’s victory.

Self then confirmed to reporters that he had spoken with Trump by phone multiple times on Friday.

‘I talked to him a couple of times today,’ Self said. ‘We had a lively discussion.’

Self did not elaborate much further on the contents of the discussion.

But the two people who spoke with Fox News Digital said Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., connected Trump with Self and Norman by phone after they voted against Johnson.

Mace would not comment, but Fox News Digital saw her and Johnson share a hug on the House floor after they and others were in the side room with the holdouts.

She was also seen in intense talks with Norman off the House floor earlier.

Norman also later confirmed to reporters that he spoke with Trump on Friday.

‘He just made his point about how Mike is the only one who could get elected,’ Norman said, adding that Trump did not change his vote but rather a ‘commitment that things are gonna change’ from Johnson.

Johnson won the House speakership in the first round of voting, after it initially appeared he was poised to lose.

Self, Norman and Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., each voted for people other than Johnson, appearing to put the speaker’s gavel out of reach.

But House leaders did not formally close the vote while figuring out a path forward. Meanwhile, GOP lawmakers were told to be on the House floor immediately in preparation for a second vote.

That second vote did not occur, however, and Johnson was sworn in as speaker on Friday afternoon.

The House of Representatives has adopted new rules that would make it harder to trigger a vote to oust a speaker.

House lawmakers voted 215-209 along party lines to set the chamber’s rules for the 119th Congress. 

Among them was a measure to raise the threshold for calling a ‘motion to vacate the chair’ – which sets off a House-wide vote to depose the sitting speaker. 

Ex-Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., agreed to lower the threshold to just one person in order to win over holdouts and clinch the speaker’s gavel in January 2023, at the start of the 118th Congress.

But the 119th Congress is now raising that number from one to nine – and amending the rule further, to specify that nine members of the sitting majority party must be the ones to call for a vote.

It sparked fury among Democrats, who accused Republicans of eroding the significance of the minority party.

‘Their proposed changes would, for the first time in American history, shield the Speaker from accountability to the entire chamber by making it so that only Republicans can move to oust the speaker,’ said Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., the top Democrat on the House Rules Committee. 

‘This makes it clear that they have no intention of working together to find common ground. Instead of electing a Speaker of the House, they have decided to elect a Speaker of the Republican Conference—held hostage by their most extreme members.’

McCarthy was notably ousted by eight House Republicans and all House Democrats after former Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., called for a motion to vacate the chair in October 2023.

The one-vote threshold hung over Johnson like the sword of Damocles for over a year after he won the speaker’s gavel later that same month.

The change is the product of negotiations between the ultra-conservative House Freedom Caucus and the more pragmatic Republican Main Street Caucus.

Other changes in the new House Republican rules package include substituting some non-gendered family language like ‘child’ and ‘parent’ to more gendered language like son, daughter, mother, and father.

It also limits the House Speaker’s ability to bypass traditional chamber processes to rush a bill to the House floor via a mechanism known as ‘suspension of the rules.’

Johnson’s use of the suspension measure to pass critical legislation with Democratic support angered GOP hardliners in the House GOP Conference.

Under the new package, Johnson will only be able to put a House bill up for a vote under suspension on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays.