Watch: Democrat Defends GOP House Speaker Mike Johnson, Calls Out 'Jokers' Trying to Remove Him
Marjorie Taylor Greene filed a motion to remove Mike Johnson from the House speakership on Friday, but it doesn’t look like the Louisiana Republican will be going anywhere anytime soon.
Johnson won the speakership in October after former California Rep. Kevin McCarthy found himself on the receiving end of the same type of motion.
This time around, however, the speaker appears to have more support in the House — both from Democrats and from at least one of the Republicans who led McCarthy’s ouster.
CNN’s chief congressional correspondent, Manu Raju, spoke with New York Democrat Tom Suozzi, who told him that he would vote against any move to try to replace Johnson.
“The Democrats have to choose if they’re going to have to vote, vote to oust Mike Johnson or if they’re going to vote to keep him in there,” Raju said, turning to Suozzi.
“Congressman Suozzi, Democrat of New York, will you vote to keep Mike Johnson in as speaker?” he asked.
Suozzi said that he would, and Raju asked him why.
“Because it’s absurd he’s getting kicked out for doing the right thing, getting the, keeping the government open,” the congressman, who recently won election to the seat vacated by disgraced Republican Rep. George Santos.
“It has two-thirds support of the Congress,” he explained, “and the idea that he would be kicked out by these jokers is absurd.”
It wasn’t clear whom Suozzi was calling jokers. It would seem to be directed at the eight Republicans who joined with their Democratic colleagues in October in voting against McCarthy, but none of them appeared to be involved in the current motion.
Greene, who filed the latest motion, didn’t vote against McCarthy in October. One of those who did — former Rep. Ken Buck of Colorado — is no longer in Congress, and another — Florida’s Matt Gaetz — has said he opposed the motion this time around.
In fact, Gaetz was only one of “several others” among the “conservative hard-liners” described by Politico as having said that they would support the current speaker.
Greene may have known from the outset that her motion to vacate the speakership because she (and numerous other Republicans) disliked his handling of the $1.2 trillion “minibus” spending bill during an election year was a gesture that would likely be seen as more symbolic than substantive.
“It’s more of a warning and a pink slip,” Greene told reporters after filing the motion, according to Fox News. “There’s not a time limit on this, it doesn’t have to be forced … But I’m not saying that it won’t happen in two weeks, or it won’t happen.”
Greene made the comment just prior to the House recessing for two weeks.
Suozzi said the “hoped” other Democrats would join him in supporting Johnson as speaker, and at least one other made that commitment Friday.
I do not support Speaker Johnson but I will never stand by and let MTG to take over the people’s House. https://t.co/qK9vNnN7tE
— Jared Moskowitz (@JaredEMoskowitz) March 22, 2024
“I do not support Speaker Johnson but I will never stand by and let MTG to take over the people’s House,” Florida Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz said in a post to X after Greene filed her motion.
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