Donald Trump tried to stem the growing tide against House Speaker Mike Johnson Monday with a post endorsing his reelection, but whether all House Republicans are actually interested in getting back on the bandwagon is another issue entirely.
In a rambling post on Truth Social Monday, Trump urged the “Party of COMMON SENSE” to support Johnson’s bid to keep the gavel in the new year.
“LETS NOT BLOW THIS GREAT OPPORTUNITY WHICH WE HAVE BEEN GIVEN. The American people need IMMEDIATE relief from all of the destructive policies of the last Administration. Speaker Mike Johnson is a good, hard working, religious man. He will do the right thing, and we will continue to WIN. Mike has my Complete & Total Endorsement. MAGA!!!” he wrote. Most of the post’s word count was dedicated to his own “flawless” reelection campaign.
In voicing his support for Johnson, Trump has set up yet another loyalty test for House Republicans.
Earlier this month, Johnson came under fire after introducing a 1,547-page continuing resolution to keep the government open until March, among a slew of other bipartisan provisions, inviting the outrage of small-government types like technocrat billionaire Elon Musk, and a slate of sycophantic Republicans.
Republican Representative Thomas Massie was so distraught that he claimed he would not vote for Johnson in the upcoming House speaker election in January.
Johnson then worked with Trump on crafting another spending bill that suspended the debt ceiling, one of the president-elect’s core demands. But this time, 38 House Republicans broke with Trump and voted against the bill. In the end, Trump’s demand that Republicans find a way to raise or abolish the debt ceiling got left on the cutting room floor.
Last week, Representative Andy Harris, who chairs the far-right House Freedom Caucus, said that Republicans need to think about whether their current leadership “is what we need” and that he was “undecided” on what House leadership should look like moving forward.
More than a few other Republicans have similarly voiced their dissatisfaction with Johnson, as it seems that the GOP’s antiestablishment bent has turned against the party itself.
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