Trump defends Johnson as Marjorie Taylor Greene pushes to oust speaker

Former President Donald Trump has come to House Speaker Mike Johnson’s defense, as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., pushes for the Louisiana Republican’s ouster from the leadership position. 

‘Well, look, we have a majority of one, OK?’ Trump told radio host John Fredericks on Monday. ‘It’s not like he can go and do whatever he wants to do. I think he’s a very good person. You know, he stood very strongly with me on NATO when I said NATO has to pay up …It’s a tough situation when you have. I think he’s a very good man. I think he’s trying very hard. And again, we’ve got to have a big election.’ 

Fredericks had asked the presumptive GOP nominee, who spent earlier Monday in a Manhattan courtroom listening to his defense and prosecutors’ opening statements in Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s hush-money criminal trial, how he squares ‘this divide with MAGA and Mike Johnson.’ 

Trump did praise Johnson for having secured as part of the package that Ukraine would receive more than $9 billion of economic assistance in the form of ‘forgivable loans.’

‘We’ve got to election some people in Congress, much more than we have right now,’ Trump continued. ‘We have to elect some good senators. Get rid of some of the ones we have now, like Romney and others. And we have to have a big day, and we have to win the presidency. If we don’t win the presidency, I’m telling you I think our country could be finished… We are absolutely a country in decline.’ 

Greene, a strong Trump ally, called on Johnson to resign after the House passed a $95 billion foreign aid package that includes about $61 billion for Ukraine, or she would move to have him ousted as Speaker. 

‘Mike Johnson’s leadership is over. He needs to do the right thing to resign and allow us to move forward in a controlled process,’ she told Fox News’ ‘Sunday Morning Futures.’ ‘If he doesn’t do so, he will be vacated.’

Though Johnson has drawn ire from some House conservatives for working across the aisle to secure deals with President Biden on federal spending, government spying and, most recently, Ukraine, the political environment has changed since House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., was removed from the speakership over similar frustrations last October. 

Inching closer to the November election, Republicans maintain a slimmer majority after McCarthy resigned from the House after his ouster as speaker and Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., was expelled from the lower chamber of Congress. Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., voiced support for Greene’s motion to vacate Johnson from the speakership last week. 

But Rep. Bob Good, R-Va., head of the House Freedom Caucus who supported McCarthy’s ouster, told The Hill he opposed booting Johnson from the top job. 

‘My judgment and estimation is that this is not the time to do that,’ Good reportedly said.