Top House Republicans are moving to quiet dissent over Speaker’s Paul Ryan’s rocky relationship with Donald Trump as some on the far right of the GOP conference are threatening to stir up trouble in leadership elections next month.
Regardless of what happens on Election Day, Ryan is in a difficult situation given the deep divisions in the Republican Party. He has become a target of Trump’s grassroots supporters, and there is some concern among members that if Trump loses outside groups could try to put pressure on GOP offices to dump Ryan as speaker, especially if they don’t like the outcome of the year-end spending bill Congress will take up.
And if, as most members told CNN, there is a smaller Republican majority — potentially 230 seats or less compared to the 247 they have now, the speaker’s room to maneuver will shrink with fewer moderates in his party, boosting the clout of his biggest critics: members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus.
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