Former President Donald Trump spoke highly of Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) during a joint press conference at Mar-a-Lago early Friday evening but did not explicitly oppose the motion to vacate against Johnson introduced by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA).
After Trump and Johnson spoke about the border, with Johnson revealing plans to introduce legislation to prevent illegal aliens from voting, Trump opened it up to questions from the press.
In the first question, one reporter asked Trump if he backed Greene’s motion to vacate the chair—the same mechanism used to oust former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) in October—or if he stood behind Johnson.
“We’re getting along very well with the Speaker, and I get along very well with Marjorie. We have a Speaker, he was voted in, and it was a complicated process,” Trump said. “It’s not an easy situation for any Speaker.”
“I think he’s doing a very good job. He’s doing about as good as you’re going to do, and I’m sure that Marjorie understands that, and she’s a very good friend of mine, and I know she has a lot of respect for the Speaker,” Trump added.
Greene, a close ally of Trump, introduced a motion to vacate against Johnson on March 22 before the Easter Recess. She and Johnson met on Wednesday at the Capitol.
UNITED STATES – APRIL 11: Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., center, Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., and Dan Meuser, R-Pa., are seen on the House floor before Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida addressed a joint meeting of Congress in U.S. Capitol on Thursday, April 11, 2022. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
“[I] explained that he is the Republican leader, that he is the leader of the opposition party against the Biden administration, and we expect him to lead that way, not to pass the Biden administration’s agenda,” Greene said upon leaving the Speaker’s office, as Breitbart News Capitol Hill Correspondent Bradley Jaye noted:
The fiery Georgia Congresswoman insisted she has not determined when — or if — she would force a vote on the motion to vacate, and repeatedly reiterated Johnson’s future will depend on his handling of the reauthorization of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act [FISA} and funding Ukraine’s flagging war effort against Russia.
Hours before the joint presser on Friday, 86 House Republicans, including Johnson, and other top House Republicans like Conference Chair Elise Setfanik (R-NY) and Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA), voted against an amendment–which would require a warrant for surveillance on Americans’ communications– to a bill reauthorizing Section 702 of FISA.
“Section 702 is a law that is meant to target foreign adversaries, but often surveils Americans’ private communications without a warrant,” as Breitbart News Policy reporter Sean Moran noted.
