What Mike Johnson Has Said About Donald Trump

Republicans have nominated top Donald Trump ally Rep. Mike Johnson as their latest candidate for House speaker, replacing previous nominee Majority Whip Tom Emmer after just a few hours.

In the latest example of the chaos surrounding the GOP’s attempts to replace Kevin McCarthy, who was ousted as speaker more than three weeks ago, Republicans in the lower chamber selected two lawmakers to run for House speaker on Tuesday in the space of a matter of hours.

Emmer, who is one of just two GOP lawmakers to put themselves forward for House speaker who did not vote to object to the certification of the 2020 election results, dropped out of the race after it became clear he would also not get enough support from his party to get the 217 needed in a full House floor vote. Emmer’s decision to end his House speaker bid also arrived after Trump issued a scathing statement saying that “voting for a Globalist RINO [Republican in name only] like Tom Emmer would be a tragic mistake!”

In a follow-up ballot on Tuesday, House Republicans voted to replace Emmer with Johnson, a staunch Trump supporter who took steps to overturn the 2020 election results which was won by President Joe Biden. Whether Johnson will suffer the same fate as Reps. Emmer, Steve Scalise and Jim Jordan in not being able to get the almost unanimous backing from his own party in order to get elected House speaker remains to be seen.

Mike Johnson (R-LA) speaks on Capitol Hill, Washington, D.C., on October 24, 2023. Johnson won an internal party vote just hours after previous nominee, Majority Whip Tom Emmer, buckled under a backlash led by former President Donald Trump and announced his withdrawal. SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images

Johnson, 51, an attorney, has long been a close ally of Trump during his time in Congress, including serving in the former president’s legal defense team during his two impeachment trials in the Senate.

The Louisiana congressman was one of 147 House Republicans who voted against certifying the 2020 election results in favor of Biden on January 6, 2021.

In a November 7, 2020 post on Twitter, now called X, Johnson said he called Trump after Biden was declared the winner of the election and told the former president: “Stay strong and keep fighting, sir! The nation is depending upon your resolve. We must exhaust every available legal remedy to restore Americans’ trust in the fairness of our election system.”

In December 2020, Johnson also rallied his fellow House Republicans to sign an amicus brief supporting a Texas lawsuit that would have invalidated the election results in the key swing states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Georgia, which Biden won in 2020.

“President Trump called me this morning to let me know how much he appreciates the amicus brief we are filing on behalf of Members of Congress,” Johnson posted on X. “Indeed, ‘this is the big one!’

In June 2022, Johnson hit out at the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 attack, accusing the proceedings of being “nothing but the third impeachment of Donald Trump.”

Johnson, vice chairman of the House Republican Conference, has also defended Trump while the former president has faced criminal charges across four separate investigations.

In March 2023, as Trump was facing felony falsifying business records charges in New York, Johnson posted on X: “Many of us were traveling home from Congress this evening when news broke that the Soros-funded, violent crime-ignoring D.A. Alvin Bragg is proceeding with a bogus indictment of former President Donald Trump.

“This unprecedented weaponization of our justice system is as shameless as it is dangerous. The Left now knows no bounds. We will keep fighting around the clock to expose and defeat their perverse agenda and restore the rule of law.”

Even before he backed the attempts to not certify the 2020 election results, Johnson noted how much he had risen through the ranks to become a Republican keenly valued by Trump.

“It’s surreal; when I call him, he calls back within a couple of hours,” Johnson said while on the campaign trail with the president in New Hampshire in 2020, reported USA Today. “I believe he sees me now as a trusted ally.”

However, there have been times when Johnson has spoken out against the former president.

In a December 2020 interview, Johnson said Trump must “exhaust” all legal options with regards to trying to support the baseless voter fraud claims in order to ensure confidence in future elections.

When asked by Robert Doar, president of the American Enterprise Institute, whether Trump should concede he lost the last election so voters can have faith in the constitutional process, Johnson replied: “He has to do that, there’s no question about that.

“But the only question is, what is the appropriate time? Is it right now? Or do you wait until the final case is resolved?”

In 2017, Johnson also voted against the GOP’s original planned replacement for the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, because it was “haphazardly drawn.”

“The last thing I ever imagined when I was elected was that I would have to say no to the president on his first major piece of legislation,” Johnson said at the time.

Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.

Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.

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