The Republican Party has become “desperate,” according to one member of Congress — and the member who said that might be surprising to some.
Over the weekend, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, the firebrand Republican from Georgia, made those comments while she was discussing House Speaker Mike Johnson’s future.
Johnson has only been in the Speaker role for about three months, and he only assumed the gavel after former Speaker Kevin McCarthy was ousted by members of his own party.
Johnson wasn’t even the most likely candidate to become Speaker. Multiple other GOP representatives who stepped up to the plate before him weren’t able to get enough votes of support to lead the lower chamber of Congress.
Now, Johnson’s tenure seems to be on the brink as well.
On Sunday, Politico reported that there are whispers “about whether he can hang on to his role after 2024 — if he even makes it that far.”
One of the people speaking loudest against Johnson’s long-term future as speaker is MTG. She has already threatened to file a motion to vacate if the speaker doesn’t meet the demands that she and some other hard-line conservatives in the House have made.
As part of the deal that McCarthy negotiated at the beginning of 2023 to become speaker, only one member of the House is needed to bring forth a motion to vacate the leadership position.
Among those demands is providing no more military aid to Ukraine. Greene, and many other GOP members of the House, have said they believe that money should be kept here in the U.S. and spent on more important domestic issues, such as securing the southern border with Mexico.
Greene spoke with Politico about this situation, saying that one of the only reasons why Johnson is still in his speaker role is because the GOP is desperate. That being said, she added of Johnson:
“I don’t think he’s safe right now. The only reason he’s speaker is because our conference is so desperate.”
Johnson has been pressed by multiple media outlets about the threats that have been levied against him by members of his party. Last week, for instance, he appeared on CNN and spoke about the threats that Greene made about his future as speaker.
He replied, though, that he wasn’t worried about all of that. He said:
“No, I have a job to do. We all have to do our jobs. Marjorie Taylor Greene is very upset about the lack of oversight over the funding and over the lack of an articulation of a plan, as am I.”
Kaitlan Collins, the host of the CNN program, then asked Johnson about what he thought about Greene saying she would vote “no” to any bill that would provide more funding to Ukraine.
Johnson replied:
“I understand. I’ve talked with her about it personally at great length and she’s made her position very clear. We have to do our job. We have to continue to ensure that we’re covering all these bases, and we’ll see how this all shakes out.”
