WASHINGTON — Utah Rep. Mike Kennedy was sworn in on Friday afternoon, but not until he first engaged in an interesting vote for the House speaker.
Kennedy supported House Speaker Mike Johnson, who managed to garner the 218 votes necessary to keep his gavel.
Johnson addressed the House of Representatives after his win and remarked on the oath elected officials have to take to be sworn into office.
“It’s the same one oath for one nation, and under the banner of one great American flag. This is an opportunity for us to protect our shared American heritage, to maintain the conditions needed for self-government and to defend … the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” he said.
After Johnson was sworn in as speaker, he then swore in the members-elect en masse. “Congratulations. You are now members of the 119th Congress,” he said.
This marks Kennedy’s first term in federal office. The Utah Republican, who will represent Utah’s 3rd District, brings his experience as a practicing physician, trained lawyer, and former state lawmaker to the nation’s Capitol.
Last month, Kennedy took a trip to Washington, D.C., for the new member orientation.
“While I’m not officially sworn in until Jan. 3, I’m already laying the groundwork to fight for Utah, heal America, and make our nation stronger than ever alongside my colleagues and President Trump,” he said at the time. Kennedy also attended a meeting with the other members of Utah’s congressional delegation to strategize on a united approach to the 119th Congress.
“We have a lot to accomplish: from making the Trump tax cuts permanent and making life more affordable for families to securing our border and restoring common sense in Washington,” Kennedy said. “I’m ready to work for our district and state to deliver results.”
Kennedy served in the state Legislature for nearly a decade after entering office in 2013. He left in 2018 to run unsuccessfully against Mitt Romney in the Republican primary for the U.S. Senate before returning to the Legislature in 2020 by winning a special election for Utah Senate.
As a state lawmaker, Kennedy was heavily focused on health care. He will serve on the House Natural Resources and Science, Space and Technology committees. Kennedy hopes to leverage these positions to shape legislation around Utah’s priorities for public lands, energy production and rural economic development, as well as further the Beehive State’s tech and aerospace industry.
First District Rep. Blake Moore, R-Utah, who is vice chairman of the House Republican Conference, issued a statement on X, celebrating his third term in office. He said he looked forward to working with Johnson, the Trump administration, his colleagues on the House Ways and Means and Budget committees, and “community leaders to advance a dynamic conservative agenda that uplifts Utahns & Americans across the country.”
Utah Republican Reps. Celeste Maloy and Burgess Owens also returned to their seats. Maloy said she is “humbled to once again serve Utahns in the 2nd District,” in a post on X. “With Republicans in the majority, we will reverse the harmful policies of the last 4 years,” she added.
Owens displayed enthusiasm for a House GOP “united behind Speaker Johnson” and said they’re going to “hit the ground running to deliver” the president-elect’s agenda, according to another post on X.
Here are some facts about the makeup of the House of Representatives in the 119th Congress.
- With a current partisan breakdown of 217 Republicans to 215 Democrats, Johnson will preside over the narrowest House majority in nearly 100 years.
- Rep. Maxwell Frost, D-Fla., who took office in 2023, remains the youngest member of Congress at 27 years old.
- New Jersey Democrat Herb Conaway and Missouri Republican Bob Onder are lawmakers who have earned degrees in both medicine and law.
- Democrats sent 94 women to serve in the lower chamber. This is up two from last year.
- Rep. Yassamin Ansari, D-Ariz., is the first Iranian-American Democrat in Congress.
- Rep. Janelle Bynum, D-Ore., is the first Black member of Congress from Oregon.
- Rep. Sarah McBride, D-Del., is the first transgender member of Congress.
- Rep. Nellie Pou, a Democrat, is the first Latina to represent New Jersey.
- Republicans elected 31 women to the House in November, compared to the record of 34 set in 2022.
The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.
