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lite.cnn.com - on gopher - inofficial
ARTICLE VIEW:
Doing ‘the right thing’ may cost Johnson his speaker’s gavel
Analysis by Stephen Collinson, CNN
Updated:
8:11 AM EDT, Thu April 18, 2024
Source: CNN
It took less than six months for to reach his existential moment.
The Louisiana Republican has arrived at fateful but familiar crossroads
where he must either choose to honor a conventional vision of US
national interests or side with the wrecking ball antics of his
party’s far-right bloc.
It’s a choice with which his immediate predecessors – Kevin
McCarthy, Paul Ryan and John Boehner – wrestled before him. Their
refusal to lead the US into debt or financial crises or to compromise
America’s global role ended up driving them into political oblivion.
Now, as Johnson tries to pass to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan — vital
to protecting US allies from Russian, Iranian and Chinese
totalitarianism and preserving US power and prestige – he’s having
to put his own job on the line to confront GOP extremists who accuse
him of betraying the party’s base.
“When you do the right thing, you let the chips fall where they
may,” Johnson said in an on Wednesday ahead of three critical days
that could decide whether he can cling to his gavel.
The prospects for the rookie speaker look grim. His tiny majority means
he can’t afford to lose more than one GOP vote to pass a bill on a
party-line vote. And two hardliners, Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene of
Georgia and Thomas Massie of Kentucky, are threatening to call a vote
to oust him if he puts the Ukraine bill on the floor.
Other right-wing Republicans are warning Johnson must make $60 billion
in Ukraine aid conditional on tough new border security measures
despite the party’s trashing of the most conservative immigration
compromise in decades at presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump’s
behest.
Schism in GOP could drive Johnson out
The schism in the GOP highlights how Trump has eroded the party’s
internationalist principles in favor of his “America First” creed.
Lawmakers like Greene and Texas Rep. Chip Roy counter traditional
national security arguments by warning there is no greater US interest
than protecting the southern border, following high levels of crossing
by undocumented migrants in recent months.
Roy, who is yet to decide whether to back an effort to oust Johnson,
told CNN Wednesday that he was “disappointed” in the speaker and
was “past the point of giving grace.” Johnson’s increasing
vulnerability on this issue is particularly acute since he was also
arguing for months that there could be no Ukraine aid without using the
same measure to force the White House to introduce draconian measures
at the US border with Mexico.
Rising right-wing opposition to his foreign aid plans has left Johnson
in a deeply vulnerable position. To even pass a rule to set up a
cascading series of votes on the bills this weekend, Johnson is almost
certain to need Democratic votes. The minority party may also have to
save him if Greene calls up her motion to vacate the speaker’s chair
– a step several Democrats say they are prepared to take to ensure
that Ukraine aid will pass at a moment when Kyiv warns it will lose its
war of survival without urgent help. This could save Johnson in the
short term. But a GOP speaker dependent on Democratic votes will be
seen by many Republicans as a tool of the minority party and would be
on borrowed time.
Johnson’s problem is a more extreme version of one that has dogged
Republican speakers for years. A strong but small group of right-wing
Republicans elected on absolutist platforms in deep-red districts comes
to Washington with an expansive agenda and adamant they won’t
compromise with Democrats. But they lack the power or numbers to force
their will apart from in the rare phases when Republicans have a
monopoly on Washington power. The frustrated extremists then turn on
GOP leaders and accuse them of becoming traitors – simply because
they live in the land of political reality.
For example, Greene told CNN’s Manu Raju on Wednesday: “I don’t
know how long people are going to tolerate this because he is doing
nothing but serving the Democrats.”
‘We won’t get everything we want’
Johnson, who is facing claims that he’s sold out despite being
possibly the most conservative speaker in history, tried to explain his
constraints in the interview with Tapper. “The Republicans run the
House. We have the smallest majority in the House. The Democrats are in
charge of the Senate and the White House. So, by definition, we won’t
get everything we want,” he said.
The idea, however, that the party should settle for something less than
an absolutist position is not one that flies in the modern GOP, where
stunt politics that play well on conservative media are as important as
legislating. “There’s certain members that just prefer the
minority,” Texas GOP Rep. Dan Crenshaw, who supports sending new aid
to Ukraine, told CNN’s Raju. “It’s easier, just, you can always
just be against something, you never really have to work.”
The speaker had seemed to buy himself some time after traveling to
Mar-a-Lago last week to bolster Trump’s false claims of election
fraud and securing in return about the strongest public endorsement the
ex-president is likely to give. Johnson “is doing a very good job,”
Trump said. Logic suggests that the presumptive GOP nominee has an
interest in delaying a third debacle over electing a GOP speaker since
the party won the majority in the 2022 midterm elections because it
might distract from his own campaign to take back the White House. Yet
Greene, one of Trump’s top supporters, hasn’t taken his hint and is
still determined to bring Johnson down. The speaker might be wise not
to trust Trump. Loyalty to others is a fungible commodity for the
ex-president. Once Trump senses an associate is vulnerable or no longer
serves his political interests, he usually casts them loose.
Johnson’s push to put foreign aid bills on the floor separately ahead
of a possible attempt to jam them together to send to the Senate –
another move infuriating hardliners – might be a logical solution in
a normal House. In this way, those who oppose Ukraine aid on principle
could vote against it, allowing Democrats who support it to ensure its
passage. There could be a strong bipartisan vote to help Israel, days
after Iran’s air attacks, and to support Taiwan, which is
increasingly vulnerable to China’s massive military buildup. And
Republicans could get cover by voting for a separate bill that Johnson
plans to put on the floor strengthening border security. But the
extreme polarization of the GOP majority – and the lack of
maneuvering room Johnson has after the “red wave” failed to
materialize in the 2022 midterms – gives individual members the
opportunity to create chaos and makes governing all but impossible.
On Wednesday evening, for example, in another defeat for Johnson, the
House Rules Committee recessed because it was unable to pass a rule on
the border security bill, with Republicans threatening to vote against
the measure in committee.
Johnson’s tonal shift on Ukraine
One of the most interesting aspects of Johnson’s new strategy is the
way that he is now forcibly arguing about the need for the US to send
billions of dollars in aid to its allies. (In order to placate some
Republicans, some economic aid to Ukraine has been refashioned as a
loan). As a backbencher, Johnson voted against sending more funds to
Ukraine several times and he’s been careful in his six months as
speaker not to get too far ahead of GOP critics of bankrolling Kyiv’s
war effort.
But on Wednesday, he was making the kind of foreign policy argument
that could have been voiced by any GOP leader from President Dwight
Eisenhower to President George W. Bush – one that was a clear
departure from Trumpism.
“We are going to stand by Israel, our close ally and dear friend, and
we’re going to stand for freedom and make sure that Vladimir Putin
doesn’t march through Europe. These are important
responsibilities,” Johnson told Tapper. “Since World War II,
really, the responsibility for the free world has been shifted onto our
shoulders. And we accept that role. We’re an exceptional nation.”
Johnson added: “We’re the greatest nation on the planet, and we
have to act like it. And we have to project to Putin and Xi and Iran
and North Korea and anybody else that we will defend freedom.”
It was not immediately clear what has prompted Johnson’s change of
emphasis.
The shocking magnitude of Iran’s missile and drone attack on Israel
last week – even if it was largely repelled by US, Israeli, British
and Jordanian military forces – has concentrated minds on Capitol
Hill about the urgency of replenishing the Israeli arsenal.
Ukraine’s need is even more acute. Russia has continued relentless
attacks on civilians and infrastructure, and there have been multiple
warnings from top US defense and intelligence officials that without
Biden’s vitally needed aid package, Kyiv could lose the war. “I
think we’re already seeing things on the battlefield begin to shift a
bit in terms of in Russia’s favor,” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin
told the House Defense Appropriations subcommittee Wednesday. The
implications for a Russian victory would be grave and create new
security threats to the West in Europe. And the possibility that the
United States would abandon a fellow democracy under assault from a
ruthless leader in the Kremlin would shatter the country’s reputation
abroad and weaken its power as a result. That may be a stain the
speaker doesn’t want on his conscience or as part of his legacy.
Johnson, unlike his extremist members, has responsibilities as speaker
– one of the great offices of state that go beyond short-term
political interests. And he’s been under relentless pressure from
foreign leaders, as well as the White House. Biden, for instance,
warned in a Wall Street Journal article Wednesday that “both Ukraine
and Israel are under attack by brazen adversaries that seek their
annihilation.”
If Johnson can somehow engineer passage of the bills aiding Israel and
Ukraine this weekend, he’d be bolstering a global leadership role the
US played for decades. It’s a measure of how much the GOP has changed
that such a role might be considered political apostasy and could cost
him his job.
But he told reporters on Wednesday evening, while making the case that
military aid for Ukraine was now critical, “I’m doing here what I
believe to be the right thing.”
“History judges us for what we do.”
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