MTG Launches Her House Speakership Coup
Marjorie Taylor Greene is giving the Republicans the weekend to think it over.
The Republicans in the House of Representatives are a fractious lot. They ousted former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (CA) seven months ago, and after a series of moves by the current speaker, Mike Johnson (LA), some Republicans are ready to oust him, too.
This latest endeavor is being led by Marjorie Taylor Greene (GA), who called for a vote to vacate in late March but had yet to pull the trigger. She has been vocally upset after a series of broken promises by Speaker Johnson pushed her to the edge. She isn’t alone. Republicans are frustrated because Johnson has made promises but seems to have underdelivered.
As The Federalist’s Sean Davis opines, perhaps somewhat unfairly: “Mike Johnson responded to FBI corruption by giving them a new HQ, to Biden lawfare by fully funding DOJ, to border insanity by spending billions on migration assistance, to Hamas’s attack on Israel by giving them a $9 billion earmark, and to college communism by enacting speech codes. He is the single most incompetent politician I have ever seen.”
Mike Johnson responded to FBI corruption by giving them a new HQ, to Biden lawfare by fully funding DOJ, to border insanity by spending billions on migration assistance, to Hamas’s attack on Israel by giving them a $9 billion earmark, and to college communism by enacting speech…
— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) May 2, 2024
Most of these points hit home. However, it’s also true that Mike Johnson has the challenge of trying to herd a fractious party with only a one-vote majority, and that means wheeling and dealing must be done.
Greene and her Republican supporters Thomas Massie (KY) and Paul Gosar (AZ) are the only ones who have publicly supported an ouster. On Wednesday, Greene and Massie gave a press conference in which they expressed their disappointment in how the speaker is running business. Greene accused Johnson of being the leader of the “uniparty” and sharing the gavel with Democrat Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (NY). That apparently was demonstrated by Johnson putting forth a foreign aid bill in support of Ukraine.
On the flip side, let’s be frank: Greene is a firebrand but also a lawmaker à la AOC that few take seriously. This is partially because she tends to be very theatrical in her presentations and seems only interested in “The MTG Show.” She doesn’t necessarily act in the best interests of conservatives.
The Uniparty hates MAGA. They don’t want to Make America Great Again.
— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 (@RepMTG) May 1, 2024
The Uniparty is MUGA. Make Ukraine Great Again.
Another forever war spending hundreds of BILLIONS of your dollars brought to you by Uniparty Speaker Mike Johnson. pic.twitter.com/e2MnJXQO0V
Greene and Massie ended their press conference by saying they’d give Republicans the weekend to decide how they were going to vote because Greene is going to push the motion to vacate next week. In the meantime, she encouraged Johnson to resign.
For their part, House Democrats released a statement saying that if the motion to vacate came to the floor, they would join with Republicans to table it and essentially block the effort. Since many Republicans would understandably prefer not to be plunged back into the chaos of having to choose yet another speaker, it’s likely that this intervention by the Democrats will save Johnson, at least for now. Unfortunately, that means Johnson will have to continue relying on Democrats to pass legislation, and they will extract a price for their cooperation.
Johnson responded to the Greene press conference by saying: “I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about her. I got to do my job, and we do the right thing, and we let the chips fall where they may. That is my philosophy. That is how we are governing. … We are going to keep the train on the tracks and show the American people not just what we are against, but what we are for. That there is a conservative agenda that is necessary to get the country back on the right track, and the way for us to do that is to keep and grow the House majority.”
We shall see where the chips fall next week. The chaos and embarrassment of ousting another speaker and stopping the work of the House to elect a new one doesn’t seem like it’s in the best interest of the microscopic Republican majority or the American people, but neither does advancing the Democrats’ agenda without more of a fight.
