Second lawmaker supports ousting speaker, putting Johnson’s job in jeopardy
WASHINGTON – House Speaker Mike Johnson is drawing closer to peril after another conservative hard-liner publicly came out in support of forcibly removing the Republican leader from his job.
Shortly after unveiling a plan to deliver foreign aid to key U.S. allies, Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., forcibly came out against the House speaker’s proposal in a closed-door conference meeting on Tuesday morning, announcing he would support an existing effort to oust Johnson.
Massie, along with conservative Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., are calling on Johnson to step down from the top post. If he doesn’t, they are threatening to call up a vote on the House floor that could supplant the speaker and send the chamber into another leadership vacuum. Johnson, RLa., took the job in October, putting him second in line of succession for the presidency, after a handful of Republicans voted to remove former Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., from the role.
“There’s no shortage of people,” that could replace Johnson, Massie said, rebuking the speaker as “some guy nobody in America ever heard of.”
Massie’s support for what is known as a motion to vacate – a procedural vote to remove the speaker – puts Johnson’s job in jeopardy, as Republicans control the House with a razorthin majority and conservative ire continues to grow at the embattled speaker.
At a weekly leadership news conference, Johnson was defiant and said he will not resign.
“It is, in my view, an absurd notion someone would bring a vacate motion when we are simply here trying to do our job,” Johnson said. “I regard myself as a wartime speaker – and in a literal sense. I knew that when I took the gavel. I didn’t anticipate this would be an easy path.”