It’s bad enough that the Republican Party is hanging on for dear life to a razor-thin majority in the House of Representatives that most political experts believe will dissolve come the midterm elections, but it turns out it might be even worse than that for the MAGA-fied GOP, because House Republicans don’t even seem to like each other all that much, and many of them aren’t too thrilled with their House majority speaker, Rep. Mike Johnson.
On Thursday, the House voted to reopen most of the Department of Homeland Security, ending the longest agency shutdown in U.S. history, according to NPR. DHS funding was passed without secured funding for immigration enforcement functions, including ICE and Border Patrol, which, up until Thursday, Johnson had publicly refused to settle for on behalf of his party.
From NPR:
Democrats refused to back funding for many of the agency’s immigration functions in an unsuccessful effort to secure reforms including body-worn cameras and broad restrictions on face coverings after federal law enforcement killed two American citizens in Minnesota earlier this year.
The Senate, led by Republican Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., unanimously advanced this funding legislation in March. At the time, Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., referred to the proposal as “a joke” and refused to bring it up for a vote. Many members of the House Republican conference refused to fund the agency in a piecemeal fashion and did not want to negotiate over reforms to immigration enforcement operations.
Despite the fact that Republicans clearly caved to the minority party to secure DHS funding, Johnson is out here doing a faux victory lap for the media, telling constituents, “Don’t DOUBT the House Republican majority!” as if funding DHS without cutting a check to ICE was his plan all along.
It’s also worth noting that on Wednesday, Johnson was confronted by a reporter about whether or not he was “defying the White House” by holding out on the funding deal after the administration appeared to side with Senate Republicans, who were willing to compromise with Democrats if it meant a swift passage of the funding bill.
“We are not defying the White House,” Johnson told reporters. “I just got off the phone with the president.”
I wonder if any of these people understand that Congress, the coequal legislative branch of the federal government, is not actually supposed to be a subordinate of the executive branch. The whole checks and balances thing really doesn’t work when Congressional Republicans are under constant fear of the wrath of their MAGA messiah.
But, whatever. Senate Republicans, the Trump administration, and now House Republicans have all compromised their convictions to get the bill passed, although, according to the New York Times, congressional Republicans are now pushing new legislation that would pour an additional $70 billion into immigration operations, which, apparently, has Johnson’s chest puffed out as he pretends that deal is already done.
Johnson is out here trying his best to project confidence, but, behind the scenes, he doesn’t appear to have much love for he fellow House Republicans, and the feeling seems to be mutual.
From Politico:
Republicans say Johnson’s habit of making last-minute, often contradictory promises to keep his tiny majority functioning is starting to catch up with him. Frustrations over his leadership, they say, are at an all-time high.
“I think this guy has divided us with a smile,” said Rep. Max Miller (R-Ohio), a longtime Johnson skeptic who has grown more vocal with his criticism and now says “without question” he will vote against keeping Johnson as top GOP leader in the next Congress.
This week’s chaos came to a head late Wednesday, with multiple members of key Republican factions yelling and swearing at Johnson on the House floor and in closed-door meetings.
Johnson tried to quell a rebellion among conservative hard-liners by privately reneging on an agreement with a group of midwestern Republicans that would have tied legislation allowing year-round sales of an ethanol fuel blend to the must-pass farm bill.
When some of the ethanol provision’s backers ran back to the floor to try to figure out what happened, they were too late. Some later confronted Johnson, who is now promising a future vote on the matter.
“Bullshit,” Rep. Ann Wagner (R-Mo.) yelled at the speaker as he tried to explain what happened later in the day, according to three people who participated in the huddle and spoke on the condition of anonymity.
This week’s floor chaos was just the latest example of Johnson leading crisis by crisis, ultimately pulling off GOP priorities but leaving a trail of disgruntled members and staffers in his wake, according to more than a dozen Republicans interviewed for this story.
So, Republicans are going at each other like toddlers in a toy-less playpen, while they all make sure to stay quiet enough so that the toddler-in-chief doesn’t wake up and start crying, and yet Johnson is out here talking about how Republicans are “going to win the midterms so the adults stay in charge.”
The fact is, Johnson has been having a rough couple of weeks at least, as he’s still out here struggling to explain why the war in Iran that Trump and his “Department of War” keeps saying is a war is actually “not a war,” making it unnecessary for the president to wait on Congress to declare war as the Constitution demands, a narrative he’s been repeating since at least early March.
From NBC News:
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said Thursday that it is not necessary for Congress to weigh in on the Trump administration’s military action in Iran because the United States is currently “not at war.”
“I don’t think we have an active, kinetic military bombing, firing or anything like that. Right now, we are trying to broker a peace,” Johnson told NBC News in the Capitol. “I would be very reluctant to get in front of the administration in the midst of these very sensitive negotiations, so we’ll have to see how that plays out.”
At this point, I can only imagine Johnson low-key hates his job.
Poor guy.
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