January 2023 Speaker of the United States House of Representatives election

At the opening of the 118th United States Congress, the members-elect of the House of Representatives elected in the 2022 midterms held an election for its speaker, marking the 128th speaker election since the office was created in 1789. It began on January 3, 2023, and concluded in the early morning hours of January 7 when Kevin McCarthy of California, leader of the House Republican Conference, won a majority of votes cast on the fifteenth ballot. After the longest speaker election since December 1859 – February 1860, McCarthy won the speakership by making concessions to Republican Party hardliners, who had refused to support him through several rounds of voting, finding him too weak and untrustworthy. Republicans won a narrow majority of House seats over the Democratic Party in the 2022 elections. McCarthy won the nomination within the Republican conference but faced public opposition from far-right House Republicans before the vote. The opposition consisted mainly of members of the Freedom Caucus. With 19 Republicans voting for candidates other than McCarthy on the first ballot, no candidate achieved a majority and the election proceeded to additional ballots for the first time since 1923. In the first round of voting, House Democratic Caucus leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York received 212 votes, McCarthy received 203 votes, and Andy Biggs of Arizona received 10 votes; other candidates who were not formally nominated received 9 votes. On the second through the fourteenth votes, McCarthy again failed to receive a majority of votes cast. Jeffries received the support of all Democrats present on each ballot. Most or all of the Republican opposition voted for Jim Jordan of Ohio on the second and third rounds and Byron Donalds of Florida on the fourth through eleventh rounds. Kevin Hern of Oklahoma and former president Donald Trump were also nominated and received votes in various rounds. On the fourth day of voting, January 6, many of the Republicans who opposed McCarthy began voting for him following negotiations between rounds. On the fifteenth and final ballot, the six remaining anti-McCarthy holdouts voted "present", which reduced the threshold of votes needed for a majority from 218 to 215, thus allowing McCarthy to be elected with 216 votes. Among the concessions made by McCarthy to the holdouts was agreeing that the House rules for the 118th United States Congress would allow a single member to independently bring a motion to vacate the speakership. This concession proved consequential. Less than ten months later, Matt Gaetz (one of the holdouts) brought such a motion; which prevailed, thereby ousting McCarthy from the speakership.