Read the full transcript of Republican Leaders’ remarks Tuesday morning after the lower chamber clinched the majority in the election, handing Republicans full leadership of Congress and the White House next year.
Listen to the audio version here:
TRANSCRIPT:
RICHARD HUDSON: Good morning, my name is Richard Hudson, Chairman of the NRCC, and I’m here to tell you it’s morning again in America. On Election Day, America sent a clear message to reject the consequences of Democratic control. They said they couldn’t afford the basics for their families’ needs. They didn’t feel safe in their communities. Their values were under attack. Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and Keith Jeffries, the Supreme House Democrats, were the cause. Donald Trump and House Republicans are the solution. That’s why voters delivered House Republicans the majority and sent Donald Trump to the White House in a landslide.
I’m proud to have led the NRCC to achieve this victory. Even after Democrats spent $550 million spreading lies about House Republicans, we won our [offense]… flipped seats from Pennsylvania to Michigan to Colorado and beyond. The American people saw through the Democrat lies. House Republicans had better candidates and a better message about what we would do to improve their daily lives.
Though it was my honor to lead our successful effort to hold the House at the NRCC, I didn’t do it alone. House Republicans bought into the plan. We have record member participation from across our conference, and our entire incredible leadership team worked together to make it happen. I’m especially grateful to our team leader, Speaker Mike Johnson, whose dauntless energy and hard work are the reason we’re here. He’s raising $27 million directly to the NRCC and traveling to countless cities in over two dozen states to help our candidates. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
You’ve earned the gavel, Mr. Speaker, with your long days on the road, little sleep, and relentless optimism.
Now, with Donald Trump as President, Mike Johnson as Speaker, and a new Senate majority, Republicans will have unified government in Washington for the first time since the beginning of President Trump’s first term. What did we do together during that first term?
We passed historic tax cuts that led to the greatest economy in a generation. We supported border security legislation to build a new wall leading to historically low illegal crossings. We rebuilt our military in pursuit of foreign policy that led to peace and stability around the world. We had energy independence for the first time. Kamala, an extreme Democrat, right on cue, broke it. You broke it. Now Republicans have a mandate to fix it. If we deliver on the promises we campaigned on, I’m confident the American people will reward our success.
I’m ready to get back to work. Let’s get it done. And now I’d like to introduce our majority whip, Mr. Tom Emmer.
TOM EMMER: I guess he’s happy about history. You don’t get that every day, Mike. Well, that’s it. That is true. One week ago today, America has elected a Republican President, a Republican Senate, and a Republican House with a mandate. A mandate for change. A mandate for more affordable cost of living, secure borders, less crime in our streets, and a restoration of American dominance on the world stage. A mandate to put America first and make this country great again.
I’ve always said we run to win and we win to govern. Voters gave us the wins we asked for. Now it’s time for governing this year. The Speaker and the Majority Leader put together a legislative agenda that will allow us to hit the ground running on day one and begin delivering on President Trump’s America First agenda.
As a whip, I will work with every corner of our conference to ensure every voice is heard, every constituent is represented, and that we get these policies across the finish line. Our members have worked hard over the last two years to show what a House majority is capable of. We passed legislation to lower costs for families, secure our borders, and reverse the damage the Harris-Biden administration has inflicted on our country, all of which collected dust on Chuck Schumer’s desk. But now that we have the trifecta, it’s finally time to counteract the Democrats’ negligence once and for all by turning our agenda into law.
And I have no doubt that this House Republican team will get it done. The time for failed policies that have wreaked havoc on hardworking Americans for the last four years is over. The time for proven leadership is now. And with that, I turn it over to one of our proven leaders, our Majority Leader, Steve Scalise.
STEVE SCALISE: Thank you, Whip. Last week, the American people delivered a mandate to this town, to Washington, that they want to fix the problems that have been plaguing families all across this country for the last three and a half years. You know, I got the opportunity to travel to every single swing district throughout the nation, and I got the opportunity to travel to a number of swing districts with President Trump, and I saw the same theme come up everywhere we went. People are curious that there’s an open southern border and they want it closed.
People are struggling because they can’t afford to buy food or fill up their cars or pay their utility bills. And the leaders in the White House were not listening. And what we talked about when we were out on the campaign trail and our candidates talked about were real issues, real solutions to the problems that those families were facing. We talked about how Republicans, if we get the White House in the House and Senate, would act quickly to get our economy moving again, to lower costs at the grocery store, to lower electricity costs, to secure our southern border and restore America’s place in the world.
Those were the issues we actually ran on and talked about in every community in America.
And the American people responded. And the other side is sitting around trying to blame themselves and assign blame for what the reason was for their failure, but they still will not admit the real problem why Democrats were rejected at the polls last week. It was because they had no answers. They had no message to those families who were struggling. They wanted to double down on the same failed far-left policies that they’ve been ramming through Washington for the last four years. That caused this inflation, that caused the open borders, that caused the problems that families are facing.
And so as we prepare for this unified government, this unique opportunity that the American people have given us, one thing the American people can rest assured in knowing is that President Trump and his Republican majority are already planning to go to work for them on day one in January to start fixing those problems.
We have an agenda we’ve been planning for the first hundred days to lower food costs, to lower energy costs, to secure America’s border, to get this economy moving again so those families who have been struggling can finally get back on their feet, can finally have some savings in their pockets so they can send their kids to college, so they can go on a family vacation, so they can have work they don’t pay. That’s an agenda we’ve been working on with President Trump for months now. We didn’t wait until the day after the election to start planning this. And this shows the relentless focus of Donald Trump.
He knew that if he had won the election, this would be his last opportunity to serve as President of the United States. And there will not be a minute to waste. And you can see his resolve already in how quickly he’s making really good, smart picks. I know he’s already pulled a few really talented people out of the House, hopefully no more for a little while until special elections can come.
But it shows you the talent that we have and the ability we have to get this country turned around quickly. The American people are hungry for it. And they’re going to find a Republican leadership ready to work for them so that they don’t have to struggle any longer. And the man leading that charge, who worked as tirelessly as ever, and I know the WIP and our CC chair were talking about this, nobody’s traveled around the globe, theoretically, more than Mike Johnson, to ensure that even though some of the pundits said we couldn’t hold the House, we would hold the House so that we could continue delivering those promises.
Our speaker of the House today and tomorrow, Mike Johnson. Thank you, Steve, our great majority leader.
MIKE JOHNSON: Thank you to our whip, Emmer, our NRCC chairman, Richard Hudson, all three of these gentlemen and our leadership team, Elise and all the rest, Blake Moore and McLean and Palmer and everyone, did everything possible to ensure that we could come to this moment. It is a beautiful morning in Washington. It is a new day in America. The sun’s shining, and that’s a reflection about how we all feel. This is a very, very important moment for the country, and we do not take it lightly. We did work really hard to bring this day about.
The actual statistics are even harsher than you said, Richard. My team calculated these only last night. Actually, when it was all said and done, it did more than 360 campaign events in over 250 cities across 40 states. And I logged enough miles to circumnavigate the globe five and a half times, but it was worth it. It was worth it. And we got extraordinary candidates. We moved these to red as we planned, and we kept this majority. We expect that the majority will be larger than last time.
We still have a number of races outstanding, but we’re very optimistic about those, and we are looking forward to governing in unified government beginning in January. It’s true that on Tuesday voters rejected what they really felt was the mystery of the last four years. We’re moving on, and we’re turning the page, and this is something that the American people desperately need and deserve. We want to raise an America First banner about this place.
And you saw a demographic shift, and I was talking about it on the campaign trail for over a year, with new demographics, new groups of persons who had not traditionally been with a Republican Party who came on board with us because they believed in what we were saying. They believed the answers that we were providing for all the great challenges facing the country, and we made them a commitment to do that, and we will. And as the new members return now, we lay the groundwork for the next Congress, and we usher in this new day in America.
Republicans in the House and Senate have a mandate, it’s true, to decide to win across the nation. The American people want us to implement and deliver that America First agenda, and we have to do that while we have that energy and that excitement beginning on the very first day of the Congress in the new year. It is clear the American people do want secure borders. They want to prevent terrorists and criminals from entering the country. These things are common sense.
They want and deserve lower costs for groceries and gasoline. They want us to project strength on the world stage again and not the weakness that we have projected for the last four years. They want an end to the wokeness and the radical gender ideology, and a return to common sense in our children’s classrooms and corporate boardrooms and government agencies. We’re going to ensure all this is true.
This leadership will hit the ground running to deliver President Trump’s agenda in the 119th Congress, and we will work closely with him and his administration to turn this country around and unleash, as he says, a new golden age in America. That’s not a campaign slogan. We believe that that is true. We believe in our hearts that America’s best days are ahead of us, and we’re excited to deliver upon that promise.
The only way we’re able to work quickly is because we have unified control of the Congress. Both chambers are now in the White House beginning January. And I want to congratulate all our Republican incumbents who have worked so hard to ensure their reelection and our new members who have helped us to keep this House of Lords, especially a couple of new members that flip districts from red to blue, people like Tom Barrett, Brian McKinley, Rob Resnahan, Tim Moore, Addison McDowell, Radnod, Dave Evans, from different states around the country who have worked really hard to ensure that we can have Republicans return to the seat. And we have an amazing group of freshman members who are going to join our conference, the patriots who are already here and who are ready to implement this agenda on day one.
Now, as we sit here this morning, we’re still watching a number of races. We have races still pending in Alaska, Arizona, California, Maine, Ohio, and Oregon. And we’re going to ensure that every single legal vote is counted in those races. So while we’re completing the work of this Congress, we’re shifting gears and preparing for the next Congress, we’re also still in campaign mode at some time and awaiting the final outcome of these races.
Looking ahead over the past year, I’ve been working with our committee chairs and our colleagues to lay the groundwork for this America First agenda. It will grow our economy and reduce inflation. It will secure our borders. We will restore America’s energy dominance once again. We will implement educational freedom, and we will drain the swamp. And that’s just the beginning of the agenda. This leadership team in Miami has been preparing for this moment, and we are ready to deliver on America’s mandate in the next Congress.
When President Donald Trump won the presidency in 2016, we all looked back and recognized that the Republican Party was not fully prepared for that moment, and precious time was wasted in getting to that Congress. I know it well, because that was my freshman year in Congress. It began in 2017. We are not going to make those mistakes again. We will be ready on day one. We are prepared this time. As we wind down the 118th Congress, we’ll be ready to take the ball and run both me and the 119th Congress at the beginning of January. If you have any questions, we can answer them.
Mr. Speaker. Yes. President Trump and I have talked about this multiple times today for the last several days. We have had various controversies. We have a really talented Republican Congress. We’ve got really competent, capable people here. Many of them can serve in really important positions in the new administration, but President Trump fully understands and appreciates the math here, and it’s just a numbers game. We believe we’re going to have a larger majority than we had last time. It’s too early to handicap it, but we’re optimistic about that. But every single vote will count, because if someone gets ill or has a car accident or a late flight on their plane, it affects the vote on the floor. So I think he and the administration are going to tune to that. I don’t expect that we will have more members leaving, but I’ll leave that up to him. But, yes, are we talking about it? Yes, all the time.
Mr. Spiegel. Go ahead. Yes, you speak. Have you had discussions with the President-elect and the election about how we want to deal with the Trump administration conference? We’ve talked a little bit about it. I’ll be having further conversations. My plan is to be in Mar-a-Lago all weekend to iron out details on the plans ahead. So as you can imagine right now, he has a lot going on. He has to fill out a cabinet, he has to appoint his top staff, and he’s beginning to do that. We’re delighted with Dick so far. I think it’s a great show at the Thunder. But he and I have both had a lot going on. So we’ll be talking about that and a number of other items over the weekend. I’ll see him Thursday night, and we’re collaborating with him to come to Capitol Hill tomorrow. So we’ll have lots of time over the weekend, and we have things ahead, so we’ll stay tuned.
Mr. Spiegel. Mr. Spiegel. One second. I just need my pen. There’s obviously an important leader for those candidates in the next state senate. Do you have a favorite? The question was do I have a favorite in the race for senate leader. On the open side, they’re all my favorites. How about that? Look, I think just really all my candidates who are there, all three of these gentlemen are friends. I’m not going to put my thumb on the scale of that. I’ve got enough to manage over here. But whoever is ultimately elected a new leader, we look forward to working with them, beginning immediately.
And I have been working for a long time, over almost a year now, with the previous in the leadership and with leaders of each state over there, our teams working together methodically, deliberately, consistently, to prepare for the eventualities that we have. We really believed. It wasn’t just, oh, they were making fun of the speaker. Oh, he’s sunny optimism. He thinks he’s going to win. I really believed from day one. I believed it in my heart that we would win the unified government. I knew that the people were disgusted, really, with the direction of the country. I was feeling it as I was going out traveling around the country. I mean, I went coast to coast, north, south, east, west. That energy was out there. I don’t think the polling was fully measuring that. And I was gauging that out on my own observation everywhere I went in the country.
So this was not a surprise to us. We had prepared for it, and we look forward to whoever is elected leader to go forward. But it did matter to us.
Mr. Speaker, have there been discussions about the use of reconciliation, especially for the forthcoming budget bill? Yes, we have been talking for almost a year about the use of budget reconciliation as a method to achieving some of the desired ends. As old President Trump many times said, we all trust. We believe we can be the most consequential Congress in the modern era, and he the most consequential President, because we quite literally have to take almost every measure of public policy, every commitment, everything. So the budget reconciliation process is a very efficient means to solving a lot of that, everything related to the budget and spending and all the rest, regulatory reform. So we have lots of very specific plans to kind of do that. And the details of that will come together in the coming weeks.
Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, can you tell us a little bit more about what you expect from the President-elect when he’s coming here to the Hill? You know, what’s on the agenda? Well, I’ll say the agenda practice is new this morning. I got it. President Trump is going to meet with President Biden right now. And so it was suggested, in fact, I think he said it first before I did, but that he wanted to come and visit with House Republicans.
So we’re working out the details of him gathering with us potentially tomorrow morning before he goes to the White House. And that will be a great meeting and a moment for all of us. There’s a lot of excitement, a lot of energy here. We’re really grateful for President Trump leaving it all on the field to get reelected. He quite literally did. I mean, they scheduled him almost every hour of every day for a month on that, and he did that. And that’s what inspired his stamina. It inspired so many of our candidates and incumbents around the country to go and give more and do more and lead more on the field because he was doing it. And I think the American people appreciate that. I think that’s reflective of the mandate that he was given, given winning the popular vote and the Electoral College was decisive. And we’re excited about that, celebrate that moment with him. He certainly deserves it.
Mr. Speaker. Are Republicans drafting a plan to get rid of the Department of Education? Has this been discussed with the president-elect? Is it something he has suggested on the campaign trail? We’re not going to get any details about any specifics with regard to reforms in specific departments. There’s lots of ideas on the table, but we’ve got to work together with the local census, work in coordination with the Trump administration on the order of the reforms and how we do it. So I’m not getting ready to give you details on that.
Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker. You were very concerned about non-citizen voting. What’s your assessment of the impact that non-citizens had on this election? Well, look, the mantra and what we said at the rally and what President Trump was apt to say all the time at the end of each and every debate, and we did, but we know for a fact that non-citizens voted in some places around the country because they were signing up to vote and they were defying federal law, but the states are not enforcing the requirement that there be proof of citizenship before they vote.
So I am grateful to tell you, and I’ve said this on the campaign trail for a year, that I have confidence that because of the chaos that was related to the 2020 election, most of the states got busy, their credit, the legislatures in the states got busy and passed legislation to shore up their systems in states around the country. I mean, there were hundreds of pieces of legislation that were passed and newly enacted and signed into law by the governors that shored up those systems to make sure they would be more secure.
There were a few states we were still concerned about, but I’ll tell you because of the attention that was given to it, we had eyes on those elections very closely, we had lawyers ready and prepared to run and file injunctions and report when necessary. We had poll watchers and precinct captains, and some of those are still working right now. There will be recounts in a couple of these races that will be very closely monitored. And I’m happy to report to you that because of all the emphasis we placed on that, and because of all the attention the American people put on it, I think we were able to limit to a high degree the amount of fraud and irregularity and many other things that concern all Americans after 2020. So that’s a good sign. It’s another hopeful reason, another thing to celebrate our new day in America. So thank you all for being here this morning. We’re going to get to work right now. Thank you.
