Steve Scalise is one step closer to becoming House speaker. Here’s how he could approach a shutdown fight.

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise won a significant victory in his quest to become speaker Wednesday as he gained the support of a majority of House Republicans and overcame a challenge from Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio).

Scalise’s quick victory in the GOP-only meeting means he now appears to be on the inside track to become speaker, although Wednesday’s developments are likely to set up a messy floor vote that could stretch for days.

The Louisiana politician received a bare majority of support, with lawmakers in the room reporting a final vote of 113 for Scalise to 99 for Jordan with 11 more lawmakers either supporting someone else or voting present.

The full floor vote to come will include Democrats, meaning just a few GOP lawmakers holding out could delay or perhaps even sink his final confirmation. Kevin McCarthy, operating under similar rules, required 15 votes before he secured the gavel in January.

On Wednesday afternoon, the House adjourned without a vote on Scalise's nomination as GOP leaders worked behind the scenes to try to line up the 217 votes that will be needed to push him over the finish line.

All this with less than 40 days until another government shutdown deadline.

"Obviously we still have work to do," Scalise told reporters following Wednesday’s meeting.

Unlike his rival Jordan, Scalise prevailed without offering concrete plans of how he would keep the government open with a deadline looming next month. While Jordan made clear that border demands would be a nonnegotiable part of his position and floated a short-term idea for pushing the shutdown into next year, Scalise has been less detailed.

Like Jordan, Scalise has telegraphed the border would be a key focus but in less stark language. "We are going to have a conversation as Speaker Steve Scalise about securing America's border and what we've got to do to put in place real policies," he told Fox Business earlier this week while also arguing repeatedly in various forums that his main qualification for the job is what he says is his skill in bringing people together.

As for the shutdown itself, Scalise has focused more on the regular appropriations process in the House as a way out of the crisis, aiming to complete floor consideration of all 12 bills before the looming deadline. It remains unclear, even if he achieves his goal, whether the deep differences between the House and Senate bills would be ironed out by Nov. 17.

"We laid out an aggressive schedule to complete floor consideration of all 12 appropriations bills to go into Senate negotiations with the strongest hand possible," Scalise wrote in the letter announcing his bid for speaker.

The next speaker will also face a complicated landscape, including an outstanding request for $24 billion in additional funding for Ukraine as well as possible additional funds for Israel during its ongoing war with Hamas.

In his recent comments, Scalise has been skeptical of additional funding for Ukraine, reflecting growing GOP ambivalence on the issue, but has made supporting Israel a reason to get the speaker issue resolved quickly.

Scalise has repeatedly promised that his "day one" priority if he wins is a resolution to express strong support for Israel, adding Tuesday that money could also be on the table soon.

"I talked to [Israeli Minister of Strategic Affairs Ron] Dermer last night about some things clearly that are high priorities for them," Scalise said.

This post has been updated with additional developments.

Ben Werschkul is Washington correspondent for Yahoo Finance.

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