Trump backs Johnson during meeting
Bill shared to bar noncitizens from voting, already federally banned
Former President Donald Trump gave House Speaker Mike Johnson a political lifeline Friday amid discontent with his leadership among conservatives in the House, saying, “I stand with the speaker, we’ve had a very good relationship.”
After a week filled with political setbacks for both men, and as Trump faces the first of four potential criminal trials beginning Monday in Manhattan, two of the country’s most powerful Republicans met at Mar-a-Lago to unveil voting legislation they hope will put Democrats on the defensive, even as critics say it’s based on a false premise.
Johnson is struggling to govern a fractious GOP caucus that has become increasingly disenchanted with his leadership, to the point that he is facing the threat of removal.
Johnson’s dust-up with conservatives over reauthorizing a controversial spying law this week is just the latest in a series of legislative battles that have left him vulnerable on his right flank, and meeting with the party’s presumptive 2024 presidential nominee was widely viewed as a way for the speaker to shore up GOP support.
“I think he’s doing a very good job, he’s doing about as good as you’re going to do,” Trump said of Johnson on Friday during the news conference.
Abortion debate and criminal trial
The Trump campaign’s efforts to try to neutralize the abortion issue, which has bedeviled the GOP, faced a setback this week when an Arizona court decision reinstated a near-total abortion ban in that state. Trump responded that the law “went too far,” as he worries about political blowback in a key swing state.
Friday’s meeting between Trump and Johnson came three days before jury selection starts in Trump’s hush money trial and a little more than a year after he became the first former president to be indicted.
The former president railed against the New York criminal case during his Mar-a-Lago press conference when questioned by reporters, calling it a “scam” and a “witch hunt” while saying he plans to testify.
The focus of Friday’s event was to promote a bill aimed at keeping noncitizens from voting, something already outlawed by the federal government and extremely rare, according to election experts.
Republicans see political advantage to the bill, though, as Johnson made clear.
“When we put this bill on the floor, you’re going to see a record vote by Republicans and Democrats,” Johnson said. “You’ll see that Republicans stand for election integrity and then we’ll be able to ask this very important question of the Democrats, they’re going to have to go on record.”
The voting bill fits with Trump’s emphasis on “election integrity,” which has become a catch-all term encapsulating GOP efforts to indulge Trump’s false claims about widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election and push to enact new restrictions on voting.
Democrats denounced the Trump and Johnson news conference as another attempt by Trump to spread his “big lie” about alleged fraud in 2020.
“Donald Trump and Mike Johnson don’t care about election integrity – they care only about helping Trump’s campaign of revenge and retribution to regain power at all costs,” said U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., chairman of the special committee that investigated the Jan. 6 insurrection.
Calming the right flank
The Mar-a-Lago meeting was particularly important for Johnson, whose speakership is increasingly endangered.
Johnson won the job after Republicans removed former Speaker Kevin McCarthy and engaged in a series of failed votes to find a replacement. They eventually settled on Johnson, who was little-known at the time, but was viewed as a staunch conservative who could placate the far-right wing of the party.
Dubbed “MAGA Mike” when he first ascended to power, Johnson upset conservatives by supporting spending legislation and other measures they oppose.
“As a conservative member of the conference, I’m very frustrated with the things that have happened since he has become speaker,” Rep. Greg Steube of Florida said as Johnson prepared to go to Palm Beach.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., filed a motion to remove Johnson as speaker but has yet to force a vote.
With Greene and other MAGA-friendly Republicans a thorn in his side, Johnson’s meeting on Friday with Trump posed a new opportunity for the speaker to try to calm the rebellion.
“We’re getting along very well with the speaker, and I get along very well with Marjorie,” Trump said. The former president added that Johnson was “doing about as good as you’re going to do, and I’m sure that Marjorie understands that. She’s a very good friend of mine, and I know she has a lot of respect for the speaker.”
Trump’s blessing could take the heat off Johnson for now, but right-wing fury against the embattled speaker continues to foment.
Johnson faces more difficult decisions ahead on funding for Ukraine and other issues.
Asked Friday if he supports more aid for Ukraine, Trump said, “We’re looking at it right now, and they’re talking about it and we’re thinking about making it in the form of a loan instead of just a gift.”
Trump also fielded multiple questions about abortion, including why he has flipped and now opposes federal legislation limiting the procedure.
“Because we don’t need it any longer, because we broke Roe v. Wade,” Trump said, referring to the U.S. Supreme Court decision that had protected abortion rights until it was struck down in June 2022 by a court he reshaped with three conservative lifetime appointments.
The Biden administration reacted to the news conference by seeking to keep the focus on the abortion issue, pointing to comments Vice President Kamala Harris made Friday in Arizona.
Contributing: David Jackson and Ken Tran