Yesterday’s post went up shortly before lunchtime, but it proved to be an eventful afternoon.

A couple of hours after my post, news organizations started formally pronouncing that House control would remain with the Republicans.

Shortly after that, Trump made some additional Cabinet nomination announcements, including the startling choice of Rep. Gaetz for Attorney General. Even with a 53-47 Republican Senate majority, it is far from clear that Gaetz is confirmable, noting that he currently has a House ethics investigation hanging over his head.

Make that “had”, not “has”. Later in the day, Gaetz resigned from the House, effective immediately. It has been reported that the House Ethics Committee had been planning on releasing its report on the Gaetz investigation as early as tomorrow; but with his resignation, the ethics investigation dissipates into the ether. It will be interesting to see if the unreleased report leaks anyways, particularly given that Gaetz remains very newsworthy.

Still, the Gaetz news has the Republicans down one seat immediately until a special election can be called, with the prospect of being down two additional seats if and when Stefanik and Waltz resign to assume their new posts in the Trump administration. Having said that, all three are safe Republican districts, so this is more of a timing issue than anything else.