President-elect Donald Trump has invited several groups of House Republicans to Mar-a-Lago next weekend, according to three sources involved in the planning who spoke with NBC News. Trump’s team collaborated with Speaker Mike Johnson’s leadership team to finalize the list of invited members, the sources said.
Between January 10 and January 12, members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, lawmakers from states impacted by the state and local tax (SALT) deduction cap, chairs of key committees, and other Republican groups will visit Trump at his Florida residence, just days before his second-term inauguration, the outlet reported.
The Mar-a-Lago visits come after a contentious speaker vote on Friday, where Trump personally persuaded at least two holdouts to support Mike Johnson’s re-election. The timing also coincides with Republicans preparing to tackle a major reconciliation package this spring, which is expected to include an extension of Trump’s 2017 tax law. Trump aims to ensure that Republican lawmakers from all factions are united and aligned with his ambitious legislative agenda, according to two sources involved in the planning.
A spokesperson for the Trump transition team did not immediately respond to requests for comment regarding next weekend’s visits. The divisions within the party were evident after Friday’s speaker vote, when members of the Freedom Caucus issued a letter stating that they voted for Johnson “because of our steadfast support of President Trump,” according to reports. They added, “We did this despite our sincere reservations regarding the Speaker’s track record over the past 15 months.”
Along with Trump’s victory in November, Republican lawmakers maintained control of the House and flipped control of the Senate, positioning the GOP for a smoother path to advancing its agenda once Trump is inaugurated. However, in the House, Republicans hold a slim majority and can scarcely afford to lose a single vote when pushing forward Trump’s preferred legislation. This will require near-unanimous unity among GOP House members on their legislative priorities.
In the first vote of the year, three GOP lawmakers—Reps. Keith Self of Texas, Thomas Massie of Kentucky, and Ralph Norman of South Carolina—initially cast their votes for someone other than Johnson for speaker. Self and Norman later reversed their decisions, securing a victory for Johnson, NBC News noted.
Johnson appeared on FNC’s Sunday Morning Futures and outlined Congressional Republicans’ plans to introduce one “big, beautiful bill” that would combine key elements of President Trump’s agenda. The bill is set to be passed using the budget reconciliation process within the first 100 days of the next presidency.
After host Maria Bartiromo asked how quickly the House GOP would get started on implementing Trump’s agenda, the Louisiana Republican said, “Beginning immediately. As you said, we gathered all the House Republicans together yesterday and had a full day of work. We went to Fort McNair, which is a short drive in Maryland. And everyone was enclosed together for eight or nine hours straight talking about our reconciliation agenda and the America first agenda.
“We’re 15 days out from the inauguration of President Donald J. Trump for his second term. And we want to make sure that we’re jump-starting the agenda now over the next two weeks, so that he’s prepared and ready on day one. We have a lot to do, as you know. And we have been putting all the plays together and figuring out the sequence of how we’re going to run those plays. And we’re really excited about it,” Johnson added.
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