Summary
House Speaker Paul Ryan is retiring and there's no guaranteed successor. And whichever party emerges from the November election in control of the House isn't expected to have a big majority.
The speaker holds enormous power in deciding how the House functions.
Neither party would want to loosen the power that comes from having a majority in the 435-member House, including the traditional hold on the speaker's gavel. And institutional-minded lawmakers will certainly gripe that any changes that strip away majority power would make the House function more like the Senate, with its complex rules that protect the minority.
r Changing House rules for electing the speaker. It's now a simple majority, which almost guarantees that the speaker will come from the majority party.
For example, if the majority is split 225-210, then the speaker must receive 230 to be elected.
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