politics
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said Wednesday she is going to call a vote next week to oust House Speaker Mike Johnson, forcing her colleagues to decide on sides in a difficult showdown after Democratic leaders announced they would supply the votes to avoid wasting the Republican speaker's job.
Speaking on the Capitol, Greene railed against Republican Party leaders at the very best levels and pushed back against their public pleas, including from Donald Trump, to avoid one other messy political fight so near the November election. With her, Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., was one in every of the few lawmakers to hitch her effort.
“We need leaders in the House to get this done,” said Greene, R-Ga., holding up a red “MAGA” hat from Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign movement.
“Mike Johnson is not capable of this job,” she said.
Moving forward next week, she said that “every member of Congress must take this vote.”
The standoff with Greene, one in every of Trump's most enthusiastic supporters, risks plunging Republican control of the House right into a recent round of chaos as rank-and-file lawmakers must determine whether to oust Johnson, R-La., as speaker or want to hitch him Democrats need to keep him in office.
Democrats see Johnson as a possible partner, a tricky conservative who’s nonetheless willing to steer his Republican Party away from the far-right voices that hamper the routine business of governing, including funding the federal government and, more recently, supporting Ukraine and other U.S. States allies abroad.
The Democratic leader, New York Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, and his team issued a joint statement this week saying it was time to “turn around” the GOP mess and announced that Democrats are voting for it will file Greene's motion to vacate the post of Speaker, essentially ensuring that Johnson wouldn’t be faraway from office.
“Are you going to hug Hakeem Jeffries?” Massie said in front of a poster photo of Jeffries handing the gavel to Johnson when the Republican became speaker for the primary time last fall.
Johnson's opponents are few at this point, fewer than the eight it took to oust now-former Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., last fall in the primary ouster of a sitting speaker powerful office that’s second in line to the presidential line of succession. Only one other Republican, Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, has joined Greene's.
Greene and Massie said they might give their colleagues the weekend to weigh their options before calling a vote on their resignation next week. Or, they said, Johnson could simply resign.
The unrest has engulfed a house that has already come to a virtual standstill. Unable to get his razor-thin majority to cooperate on party priorities, Johnson was forced into the arms of Democrats to get the votes needed to pass most major bills — and now, his job to maintain.
Johnson had been chosen because the last consensus candidate by Republicans after McCarthy's ouster, but he harnessed the fury of the far right when he led the passage of the $95 billion aid package for Ukraine and U.S. allies that they opposed speak out.
image credit : www.boston.com