Johnson: Talks with rebels ‘not a negotiation’
Speaker Mike Johnson has dismissed a threat to his position from rebel Republicans Marjorie Taylor Greene and Thomas Massie, insisting at a press conference Tuesday morning that “I intend to lead this conference in the future”.
He said he had “a good discussion [that] I thought was productive” with the pair on Monday over Greene’s threats to call a motion to vacate, essentially a vote to oust him, over his collusion with Democrats to fund a Ukraine funding bill.
He insisted the talks, which will resume Tuesday lunchtime, were “not a negotiation”, despite reports that Greene and Massie had made a series of demands in return for backing down on a vote. They include no more Ukraine funding, and pledge from him to only introduce legislation supported by Republicans.
Johnson said:
Everybody knows I have lengthy, detailed discussions on a daily basis with members across the conference. There are 217 of us. It takes a lot of time, this is why I don’t get enough sleep these days.
When you have the smallest majority in history you have to quite literally get everyone to work together. I’ve heard Marjorie and Thomas’s ideas, just like I have every day for the last six months, heard others. It’s not a negotiation at all.
So I take Marjorie’s ideas, and Thomas’s, and everybody else’s equally, and we assess them on their own value. And where we can make improvements and changes and all of that we do, and that’s what this is. There’s nothing more than that going on.
Whether Greene and Massie feel the same way is another matter. We hope to find out this afternoon.
Key events
Joe Biden also addressed recent pro-Palestinian protests on numerous US colleges and campuses, which turned violent in several cities and led to more than 2,000 arrests:
I understand people have strong beliefs and deep convictions about the world. In America we respect and protect the fundamental right to free speech, to debate, and disagree, to protest peacefully and make our voices heard.
I understand. That’s America. But there is no place on any campus in America, or any place in America, for antisemitism, or hate speech, or threats of violence of any kind.
Whether against Jews or anyone else, violent attacks, destroying property, is not peaceful protest. It’s against the law. And we’re not a lawless country. We’re a civil society. We uphold the rule of law. And no one should have to hide or be brave just to be themselves.
Biden acknowledged recent friction between his administration and Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the course of the war in Gaza, and Israel’s military push into Rafah. But he said his support for Jewish people in the US was unshakable:
To the Jewish community, I want you to know I see your fear, your hurt and your pain. Let me reassure you as your president, you’re not alone. You belong. You always have and you always will.
And my commitment to the safety of the Jewish people, the security of Israel, and its right to exist as an independent Jewish state is ironclad, even when we disagree.
He said his administration was “working around the clock” to free hostages still held by Hamas in Gaza:
We will not rest until we bring them all home.
Biden: ‘We must give hate no safe harbor’
Joe Biden is condemning the “scourge of antisemitism” during the US Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Days of Remembrance ceremony.
He’s commemorating the 6 million Jewish people murdered by the Nazis during the Second World War at the event in Washington DC, also attended by congressional leaders, including Republican speaker Mike Johnson and Democratic House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries.
Biden said the Holocaust was “one of the darkest chapters in human history”:
Never again, simply translated for me, means never forget.
The president also condemned the Hamas attacks in Israel on 7 October last year, and antisemitism on display during recent pro-Palestinian demonstrations at some US colleges and universities:
This ancient hatred of Jews didn’t begin with the Holocaust. It didn’t end with the Holocaust either. Or even after our victory in world war two, this hatred continues. That hatred was brought to life on October 7 2023.
Over 1,200 innocent people, babies, parents, grandparents, slaughtered in their kibbutz, massacred, brutally raped, mutilated and sexually assaulted. Thousands more carrying wounds, bullets and shrapnel from the memory of that terrible day they endured.
We have an obligation to learn the lessons of history … to not surrender our future to the horrors of the past. We must give hate no safe harbor against anyone.
There’s more pressure on beleaguered Texas Democratic congressman Henry Cuellar to resign, this time from the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (Crew) group.
Cuellar and his wife Imelda were indicted last week for bribery over their connections with Azerbaijan, prompting calls from some fellow Democrats for him to step down.
On Monday, according to Punchbowl, Cuellar’s chief of staff Jake Hochberg resigned.
Crew released a statement on Tuesday echoing calls for the congressman to step aside. Its president Noah Bookbinder said:
Representative Cuellar’s alleged wrongdoing is blatantly and astonishingly corrupt. The actions outlined in the government’s indictment demonstrate that he abused his position to enrich himself and benefit foreign interests, betraying his constituents.
While Representative Cuellar deserves a fair trial and the presumption of innocence, the serious charges leveled against him make it inappropriate for him to remain in office. Serving in Congress is a privilege, not a right, and Americans should be able to trust that their representatives, regardless of party or ideology, are working for them.
Out of respect for his constituents and for the office he holds, Representative Cuellar must resign.
We’ll be hearing from Joe Biden within the next short while. The president is scheduled to deliver remarks at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Days of Remembrance ceremony in Washington DC.
In a White House statement, Biden says this year’s remembrance is “particularly sobering” as it’s the first since the Hamas terrorist attacks on Israel on 7 October last year killed at least 1,160 people, the deadliest day for Jewish people since the Holocaust.
It also comes against a backdrop of violence on US university and college campuses, during pro-Palestinian demonstrations by students and activists. At least 1,000 people have been arrested.
Watch the national commemoration of the Days of Remembrance live as we remember the six million Jews who were murdered during the Holocaust and the other victims of Nazi persecution. https://t.co/vVyrxxUVrW
— US Holocaust Museum (@HolocaustMuseum) May 7, 2024
The Biden administration on Tuesday announced “several new actions to counter the abhorrent rise of antisemitism in the US”, which the president is expected to outline in his speech.
They include guidance to all school districts and colleges in the country on how to counter antisemitic discrimination; online campus safety resources; and a partnership with technology companies to address a rise of antisemitic content online.
The measures, the statement says, reaffirms “our nation’s sacred commitment to the Jewish people following the Holocaust: Never Again”.
We’ll bring you Biden’s remarks as they happen.
Johnson: Talks with rebels ‘not a negotiation’
Speaker Mike Johnson has dismissed a threat to his position from rebel Republicans Marjorie Taylor Greene and Thomas Massie, insisting at a press conference Tuesday morning that “I intend to lead this conference in the future”.
He said he had “a good discussion [that] I thought was productive” with the pair on Monday over Greene’s threats to call a motion to vacate, essentially a vote to oust him, over his collusion with Democrats to fund a Ukraine funding bill.
He insisted the talks, which will resume Tuesday lunchtime, were “not a negotiation”, despite reports that Greene and Massie had made a series of demands in return for backing down on a vote. They include no more Ukraine funding, and pledge from him to only introduce legislation supported by Republicans.
Johnson said:
Everybody knows I have lengthy, detailed discussions on a daily basis with members across the conference. There are 217 of us. It takes a lot of time, this is why I don’t get enough sleep these days.
When you have the smallest majority in history you have to quite literally get everyone to work together. I’ve heard Marjorie and Thomas’s ideas, just like I have every day for the last six months, heard others. It’s not a negotiation at all.
So I take Marjorie’s ideas, and Thomas’s, and everybody else’s equally, and we assess them on their own value. And where we can make improvements and changes and all of that we do, and that’s what this is. There’s nothing more than that going on.
Whether Greene and Massie feel the same way is another matter. We hope to find out this afternoon.
Speaker Mike Johnson is now at the podium, and delivering a full-throated defense of Donald Trump, and attack on “Democratic supporters of Joe Biden” he says are orchestrating “sham trials” against the former president.
It’s a direct echo of Trump’s own falsehoods about his various prosecutions, which were brought by a justice department independent of the White House, or state prosecutors.
Johnson says Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, is the victim of “lawfare” and “election interference”, because his legal troubles are keeping him from the campaign trail. Which is another favorite Trump claim.
Now he’s finally addressing his talks with rebel Congress members Marjorie Taylor Greene and Thomas Massie on Monday …
Home appliances are the first topic of discussion at the Mike Johnson press conference. The speaker himself has yet to speak.
Joe Biden-directed bureaucrats, the Republicans are insisting, are determined to take away Americans’ stoves, dishwashers, showers, air conditioners and other household appliances.
“Joe Biden, take your hands off our home appliances,” Arizona congresswoman Debbie Lesko says, touting a bill that would prevent federal regulators from imposing energy efficiency standards on them.
The Biden administration, Lesko insists, is engaged in a “scheme to take away Americans’ appliances in the name of a radical environmental agenda”.
Speaker Mike Johnson is about to address reporters at a news conference with Republican leadership in Washington DC.
We’re watching to see if he has anything to say about his talks with Marjorie Taylor Greene and her ongoing pledge to oust him.
You can watch the press conference here.
Donald Trump’s hush-money trial in New York, and today’s development that adult movie star Stormy Daniels is set to testify, is soaking up much of the oxygen surrounding the former president. But as Peter Stone reports, his constant attacks on the US justice system is fueling threats of violence and undermining the rule of law:
Donald Trump’s verbal assaults on judges, prosecutors, witnesses, jurors and the broader US justice system, are undermining the rule of law and American democracy while fueling threats and potential violence against individuals involved with the legal cases against him and egging on his extremist allies, former federal prosecutors and judges say.
In his campaign to win the presidency again, and in the midst of various criminal and civil trials, Trump has launched multiple attacks on the American legal system on his Truth Social platform to counter the 88 federal and state criminal charges he faces.
Trump, the all but certain Republican presidential nominee for 2024, has accelerated glorifying the insurgents who attacked the Capitol on 6 January 2021. He has called them “patriots” and “hostages”, while promising that if he wins, he will free those convicted of crimes as one of his “first acts” in office.
Meanwhile, Trump has repeatedly cast doubt on the electoral system. He has refused to say he will accept the results of the 2024 elections, a ploy similar to what he did in 2020 before falsely claiming the election was rigged – a claim he still maintains.
“If everything’s honest, I’ll gladly accept the results,” Trump told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel last week. “If it’s not, you have to fight for the right of the country.”
Darkly, Trump has also warned that if he loses the election there will be “bedlam” and a “bloodbath for the country”. These words referred, in part, to the fallout Trump predicted for the auto industry, but have distinct echoes of his false charges that he lost to Joe Biden in 2020 due to fraud.
Read the full story:
Talks could end impasse over vote for Johnson’s removal
A lunchtime summit Tuesday could finally offer clarity on whether Marjorie Taylor Greene still intends to press ahead with her drive to oust the House speaker, Mike Johnson, or accept a face-saving alternative that would give the impression of a win.
The extremist Georgia congresswoman is scheduled to meet Johnson for a second successive day to discuss her promise to call a motion to vacate, the procedure that could lead to a vote for his removal, over his collusion with Democrats to pass US funding for Ukraine.
Politico reported this morning that Monday’s talks, also attended by Greene’s new ally, the Kentucky congressman Thomas Massie, were cordial, if not entirely fruitful. The outlet said Johnson told reporters afterwards that they had made a promise to “keep this team together”.
But it’s not platitudes Greene is seeking, it’s concessions. Politico listed four demands of the Greene-Massie alliance, most prominently a pledge from Johnson there will be no more US aid for Ukraine as it battles a Russian invasion.
They also want implementation of the so-called Hastert rule (named for former speaker Dennis Hastert), in which legislation is only brought for a floor vote if a majority of Republicans support it; defunding of special counsel investigations into former president Donald Trump; and adoption of the “Massie rule” that automatically cuts government funding when no agreement is reached by a certain deadline.
With substantial Ukraine funding already passed, and likely to last until beyond November’s election, that demand might not be the hurdle it seems. And Johnson will be keen to avoid the embarrassment of having to rely on Democratic support in any vote to remove him.
He certainly has nothing to lose by extending the talks today, and several political analysts see the frozen Greene-Johnson relationship beginning to thaw.
We’ll be watching for developments.
Standoff between Marjorie Taylor Greene and Mike Johnson continues with ouster vote looming
Good morning, US politics blog readers.
The never ending story, also known as the Republican speaker saga, continues today with a scheduled next round of talks between firebrand extremist Marjorie Taylor Greene and Mike Johnson, the leader she has promised to unseat.
The pair met for several hours on Monday, with some observers suggesting the Georgia congresswoman is looking for an off-ramp, knowing that Democrats have already promised to keep Johnson in place in any House vote to oust him.
But it’s not an olive branch that Greene, and her new close ally Thomas Massie of Kentucky, are seeking. They want a block on further US funding for Ukraine, which caused her outrage in the first place, and a host of other political concessions we’ll look at in the blog shortly.
As things stand, Greene, Johnson and probably Massie are set to converse again at lunchtime. Whether Greene can be talked out of pressing ahead with a potentially embarrassing “motion to vacate”, the vote that could see Johnson booted, remains to be seen.
Here’s what else we’re watching today:
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Texas Democratic congressman Henry Cuellar is fighting for his political life days after he and his wife were indicted for bribery, fraud and money laundering over their links to Azerbaijan. Democratic leadership issued a lukewarm message of support, and Cuellar’s chief of staff Jake Hochberg quit Monday, with other staff said to be planning to join him.
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Johnson has a busy day, aside from his meeting with Greene and Massie. He’ll be hosting a press conference with Republican leadership this morning, and meeting King Abdullah of Jordan in Washington DC this afternoon.
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Joe Biden will deliver remarks at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Days of Remembrance ceremony this morning and meet the Romanian president, Klaus Iohannis, at the White House this afternoon.
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White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre’s daily media briefing is scheduled for 2pm ET.
