House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), facing renewed threats to his leadership, said he will not resign and sees himself as a “wartime speaker.”
Johnson’s comments came as Republicans in the House of Representatives tried to come together a plan to vote on four high-priority issues – aid to Israel, Ukraine, Taiwan and a comprehensive bill with other national security-related provisions – without further splitting the party.
Opponents of a move to replenish the US’s own weapons stockpiles, thus allowing more unused weapons to be sent into storage to the Ukrainian military, have threatened to oust Johnson.
“I am not resigning and in my opinion it is an absurd idea that someone would file an eviction motion. We’re just here to do our job,” Johnson said at a news conference after a Republican Party meeting on Tuesday morning.
The threat to Johnson’s grip on the gavel grew Tuesday as Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), a far-right libertarian House Republican, said on social media he would support an effort by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) to vote for Johnson.
“He should announce his resignation in advance (as [former GOP Speaker John] Boehner) so we can elect a new chairman without ever being without a Republican chairman,” Massie wrote.
Massie posted that Johnson said during the closed-door meeting that he would not resign. “I told him he is the only one who can prevent us from experiencing what happened last fall,” Massie said, referring to the three weeks the House of Representatives was unable to take up bills as Republicans struggled to pass a bill. find a new leader. Then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy was fired from the post.
Dissatisfaction with Johnson’s leadership has increased since he replaced McCarthy. At the top of the list of issues his opponents point to is the deal to fund the government through September, an agreement that gave Democrats much of the spending they want and Republicans some smaller victories.
He has also brought Democratic-backed bills to the floor so they can pass without amendments as long as they receive a supermajority of votes. And he last week supported the controversial renewal of a 9/11-era spy provision Several lawmakers in his party, along with many Democrats, opposed it.
Republicans have also failed to get the Biden administration to do much on immigration, which was their condition for approving further aid to Ukraine.
Greene has not yet called for a vote on Johnson’s future and described her motion to vacate the speaker’s seat as more of a warning when she first filed it in March. However, it is unclear whether she has enough votes to make it happen – even if Johnson would only have two Republican votes left before having to turn to Democrats for support.
Johnson said Tuesday he was not concerned about the threat and stressed the need for party unity as Congress faces several crises abroad.
“I consider myself a wartime speaker. In a literal sense, so are we [at war]. I knew that when I picked up the gavel. I didn’t expect this to be an easy path,” Johnson said.
“The way we get through that is by showing unity. We explain how we have answers to all these major challenges. We have those answers. We shouldn’t get in our own way.”
