It means the GOP leader would almost certainly need Democratic votes to retain his gavel if his rivals force an ouster vote.
By JORDAIN CARNEY, OLIVIA BEAVERS and ANTHONY ADRAGNA04/16/2024, 9:49AM ET
Speaker Mike Johnson’s strategy to pass long-stalled Ukraine aid has driven at least one Republican to join Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s bid to strip him of his gavel.
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) on Tuesday became the second Republican to publicly back an attempt to end Johnson’s speakership, delivering the message directly to the Louisiana Republican during a closed-door GOP conference meeting.
Massie is the first Republican to join Greene’s effort amid rising conservative frustration with the speaker’s proposed foreign aid package. It’s not clear when Greene plans to force the ouster vote, though she has vowed to do it eventually.
If she does so after Friday, when Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) is retiring, Johnson would need to lean on Democrats to save his speakership.
“The motion is going to get called, OK? Does anybody doubt that? The motion will get called. And then he’s gonna lose more votes than Kevin McCarthy. And I have told him this in private, like weeks ago,” Massie said after the conference meeting.
‘Utter waste of time’: GOP members blast effort to oust JohnsonSharePlay Video
The Kentucky Republican told Johnson, according to two lawmakers in the room, that “you’re not going to be the speaker much longer.” Massie also told reporters that he asked Johnson during the closed-door meeting to resign, but that the Louisiana Republican refused.
Though Massie predicted there were more than two Republicans who would vote Johnson out, other critics of the speaker refused to say on Tuesday if they would support an effort to oust him.
Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio) refused to talk about Johnson’s speakership, and instead dovetailed into a story about the Ohio state legislature. Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), who was the first member to warn of an attempt to oust Johnson earlier this year, said he’s “not going into that right now.”
Meanwhile, Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.), who like Davidson and Roy is a member of the conservative Freedom Caucus, kept the door open to supporting an effort oust Johnson if the supplemental passes by the end of the week.
“I don’t think it helps,” Perry said, responding to a question on whether Johnson’s strategy on foreign aid is a threat to his speakership. He added that “there’s always an alternative” to Johnson within the GOP’s ranks.
Massie’s decision was not well received during the meeting, according to several members in the room. And Republicans across the conference, including some members of the Freedom Caucus, quickly pushed back on the idea of booting Johnson, noting it would spark chaos without a clear successor — a repeat of the House’s nightmare in October.
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) — who some members of the Freedom Caucus have publicly floated as a potential alternative to Johnson next year — pushed back against the idea of ousting him over the foreign aid package.
“We don’t need that, no way. We don’t want that. We shouldn’t go through that again. That’s a bad idea,” said Jordan, a co-founder of the Freedom Caucus.
There’s not a clear consensus about who could even succeed Johnson. Greene has said that she has delayed triggering the vote in part to give the conference time to figure out next steps.
“We saw what happened last fall when this all went down — there’s not an alternative. … You are not going to get a majority of votes for any new person,” said Rep. Garret Graves (R-La.), a close ally of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy. He added: “I don’t think the threat is really real at this point.”
Johnson batted down questions about the ouster effort during a press conference after the GOP meeting, calling the idea that he would resign “an absurd notion” that is “not helpful to the cause” and “not helpful to the country.” Johnson also told Massie behind closed doors on Tuesday that he would not resign.
Johnson: ‘I am not resigning’SharePlay Video
Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) said after Tuesday’s conference meeting that he still thinks they can avoid a vote to terminate Johnson’s speakership. But one GOP lawmaker, granted anonymity to speak candidly, was less optimistic: “Folks are very discouraged. … We are screwed.”
The simmering rebellion isn’t a total surprise after Johnson on Monday evening announced his plans to send four separate bills to the floor — on aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, plus a fourth with other miscellaneous provisions. That sparked pushback from Greene and some other conservatives, who have long opposed attempts to send further cash to Ukraine. And that opposition to Johnson could grow as the week goes on.
His first major hurdle on that package will be getting it through the Rules Committee, where hardliners of his conference hold three GOP seats. But he’s expected to succeed there; while conservatives could block the bill if they unite with Democrats on the panel, Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) said on Tuesday that he will vote for the rule, which sets the parameters of the House’s floor debate, in committee.
But it gets tougher from there. To even bring the package up on the floor, Johnson will need a majority of the House. And given conservative opposition he’s almost certainly going to need Democratic support. Typically, the minority party does not help on so-called rule votes, but some have signaled they’d make an exception for Ukraine aid.
Asked if GOP leaders had the votes Tuesday, Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) reiterated that his team doesn’t “whip” how members are going to vote on procedural steps like bringing a bill up for debate.
Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) said he’s spoken with centrist Democrats in the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus about potentially supplying the votes, though he added he doesn’t “know if they’re gonna help out or not.”
“It’s just a discussion right now,” Bacon said. “But I’ve raised the issue that we’ve got four or five Republicans, maybe more — I don’t know how many — will probably vote against the rule.”
The idea of splitting the bills up and then merging them before they head to the Senate — which Johnson said Monday he is considering — is exactly the idea that Problem Solvers co-chair Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) told POLITICO that he’s been privately pitching to leadership.
Democrats aren’t yet committing to backing Johnson’s plan on foreign aid, saying they need to see the substance of the bills. And while a handful of lawmakers in the party said they would help Johnson keep his gavel if he put Ukraine aid on the House floor, it’s unclear if they’ll count his current plan as fulfilling his end of the bargain.
Democrats were told in their private conference meeting Tuesday that the money to Ukraine would still effectively be a grant, because the loan language Johnson is considering would make it difficult for Ukraine to ever pay back the money, according to one person in the room. Former President Donald Trump has repeatedly pushed to structure any further aid to Ukraine as a loan, an idea some Republicans have embraced.
If Johnson’s foreign aid plan passes the House, its fate in the Senate is uncertain. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said Tuesday that he is “reserving judgment” on the package, and he and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell have both repeatedly called on Johnson to pass their bipartisan foreign aid bill.
Nicholas Wu, Connor O’Brien, Ursula Perano and Katherine Tully-McManus contributed to this report.
Source: Politico
