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Good morning. I'm Anna Palmer and welcome to The Daily Punch, brought to you by Punch Bull News. It's Thursday, January 2nd, 2025. Let's get into the mix. Here are your Washington headlines of the day. Number one, Chip Roy holds the key to Mike Johnson's speakership. Number two, how the Nola attack could impact Trump's nominees. And number three, D.C. Police step up security. All right,

everybody, happy Thursday morning. Welcome back after the break. We are just a day away from House

Republicans starting to try to find a speaker,

unclear yet if it's going to be an easy Friday or a tough one for Mike Johnson. We're going

inside President-elect Donald Trump's orbit at Marlago this morning. There is a bit of a parlor game going on.

Just who, they wonder, will vote against Speaker Mike Johnson when the House kicks

off the 119th Congress on Friday.

So this bears repeating in all likelihood if just two House Republicans vote for someone other than Johnson on the floor during the

Speaker roll call, he can't win. Now, that, of course, would lead to chaos inside the GOP

ranks, a vast rearrangement of the trajectory of the House Republican Conference. And we've been

here before, right? We've seen it with Kevin McCarthy.

A lot of people said, hey, his argument was, I'm the best case for this.

I'm the only person who can get 218.

Well, we saw how that worked out.

Trump's argument for Johnson boils down to this.

Louisiana Republican is both A, a nice guy, and B, the only one who can win the

speaker's gavel. Some Republicans don't find this argument persuasive, however.

...