WASHINGTON — The newest Republican nominee for speaker, Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La., is slated for a vote Wednesday in the full House.
He was nominated by the GOP conference on Tuesday after three previous nominees flamed out, and while he has yet to ink the necessary 217 votes out of 221 available Republicans to become speaker, he said he’s optimistic he will win on the first ballot.
The little-known congressman was first elected in 2016, representing a solidly Republican part of north and western Louisiana. He has since ascended through the ranks, chairing the conservative Republican Study Committee and now holding the position of House Republican conference vice chair. He sits on the Judiciary Committee (and chairs a subcommittee on the Constitution), the Armed Services Committee and the newly created select committee on “Weaponization of the Federal Government.”
Here are five things to know about Johnson.
His role in promoting 2020 election denial
Johnson is a constitutional lawyer who has used his talents to craft some creative — and controversial — theories. The most notable is his role in devising an argument aimed at keeping Donald Trump in power even though he lost the 2020 election.
A New York Times article last year called Johnson “the most important architect of the Electoral College objections” on Jan. 6, 2021. His argument to colleagues was that certain states’ changes to their voting procedures during the Covid-19 pandemic were unconstitutional, an argument that became more palatable to lawmakers than the fabricated claims of mass fraud. In all, 147 Republicans voted to block the certification of Joe Biden electors.
On Tuesday night, after he was nominated, Johnson declined to respond to a question about his role in the election objections.
Earlier, during the Trump presidency, Johnson argued that then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s move to rip up a copy of his State of the Union speech was a crime.
“A lot of people have been talking about this the last 48 hours and I did a little legal memo to point out to my colleagues that she actually committed a felony,” Johnson said at the time on Fox News.
His solidly conservative voting record
Johnson’s voting record earns him a lifetime rating of 92% from the American Conservative Union and 90% from Heritage Action.
In Biden’s first two years, Johnson voted against a slew of bipartisan bills — including to establish a Jan. 6 independent commission, the infrastructure law, reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act, a modest new gun law and the CHIPS & Science Act.
Earlier this year, he voted in favor of the debt limit law negotiated by Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Joe Biden. But he voted against the stopgap bill to avert a government shutdown on Oct. 1.
The Louisiana Republican also has a theory on how to tackle the Nov. 17 deadline to fund the government.
In an Oct. 23 letter shared by Rep. Harriet Hageman, R-Wyo., Johnson proposed another short-term funding bill through Jan. 15 or April 15, “based on what can obtain Conference consensus,” he wrote, “to ensure the Senate cannot jam the House with a Christmas omnibus.” He also proposed a schedule for passing conservative appropriations bills in the interim.
His opposition to abortion and LGBTQ rights
Johnson has a spotless history of voting against legal abortion, earning an “A+” rating from Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America. Abortion rights proponents have noted his work from 2010 as a senior legal counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, citing a letter in which he fought to shut down an abortion clinic in Baton Rouge.
He voted against bipartisan legislation to codify same-sex marriage, which Biden signed into law in 2022.
Johnson authored legislation called the Stop the Sexualization of Children Act of 2022, which “prohibits the use of federal funds to develop, implement, facilitate, or fund any sexually-oriented program, event, or literature for children under the age of 10,” his office said. Critics have dubbed it a federal “don’t say gay” measure and argued that it’s aimed at barring references to LGBTQ people.
In a statement promoting the bill, Johnson accused Democrats of waging “a misguided crusade to immerse young children in sexual imagery and radical gender ideology.”
A spokesperson for the LGBTQ rights group Human Rights Campaign labeled Johnson “Jim Jordan with a jacket and a smile,” referring to the right-wing firebrand from Ohio who chairs the House Judiciary Committee.
Johnson has also cosponsored legislation by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., called the Protect Children’s Innocence Act, that would make it a crime to provide gender-affirming care to people under 18 years of age.
He has Trump’s stamp of approval, sort of
On Wednesday morning, hours before an expected vote, Donald Trump, the de facto leader of the Republican Party, said he wasn’t technically endorsing Johnson but suggesting the House elect him.
“I am not going to make an Endorsement in this race, because I COULD NEVER GO AGAINST ANY OF THESE FINE AND VERY TALENTED MEN, all of whom have supported me, in both mind and spirit, from the very beginning of our GREAT 2016 Victory. In 2024, we will have an even bigger, & more important, WIN! My strong SUGGESTION is to go with the leading candidate, Mike Johnson, & GET IT DONE, FAST!” Trump wrote on his social media platform.
During the speaker battle, Trump has proven more adept at hurting candidates than helping them win — his early endorsee, Jordan, flamed out on the floor. But Johnson’s ability to avoid Trump’s ire cleared a hurdle for him within the House GOP, which is attuned to the wishes of the “MAGA” base.
Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., called him “MAGA Mike Johnson” during an appearance Wednesday on right-wing host Steve Bannon’s podcast.
He’d be a relatively inexperienced speaker
With fewer than seven years under his belt, Johnson has a shorter length of service in the House compared to past speakers in modern history. Kevin McCarthy was in the House for 16 years before being elected speaker, Nancy Pelosi had 20 years of experience, Paul Ryan served for 16 years, and John Boehner had 20 years before ascending to the top job.
Ahead of the vote Wednesday, numerous members of Congress, said they knew little about Johnson, with some Republican senators saying they had never even met him.
Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said that he knew “very little about him,” but that it would “be interesting to see how the House runs if they choose a speaker that has no experience in leadership or as a committee chair. … Inexperience seems to be a qualification.”
Johnson would be the first speaker ever elected on the fourth ballot of a speaker election. When speaker elections have gone multiple ballots, no speaker has ever been elected on ballots four to eight.
This would also mark the first time since before the Civil War that the original leading speaker candidate for a party dropped out after votes had been cast on the floor. The last time that happened was during the election of 1859-1860 when freshman William Pennington was elected on the 44th ballot, only after the initial leading Republican candidate John Sherman withdrew.
If elected, Johnson would be the first speaker from the state of Louisiana, and the top two House Republicans would be from the Bayou State: Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
