Questioned about his role in killing the first bipartisan Senate bill providing aid to numerous allies and increasing border security, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) said the bill was DOA because it “didn’t meet the moment.”
Johnson asserted again today that the bill “would not have solved the problem,” despite winning the backing of the Border Patrol union and providing $15 billion for items like GOP-demanded ICE deportations.
Moving on to a second bipartisan Senate bill on foreign aid, which passed and which he has said he will not even bring up for a vote in the House, Johnson said that “we are not going to be forced into action by the Senate.”
Reporter: You yourself were part of killing the senate compromise bill. You say there need to be solutions, what are house Republicans doing to get to a solution on the border and on Ukraine? Or are you going to actually do nothing? pic.twitter.com/3CjaN9BCx0
— Acyn (@Acyn) February 14, 2024
In an affront to citizens following House proceedings, including Senator James Lankford (R-OK) who negotiated the key features of the blown-up border bill, Johnson then complained the “latest product they sent us over does not have one word in the bill about America’s border.”
Pressed on which measures the House itself will take to address the issues whose Senate solutions it keeps rejecting, Johnson said “The House is working its will.”
Johnson vowed, acknowledging a late start: “We will do our duty on this matter and all that begins right now.”
Johnson had earlier — and repeatedly — denied charges (even from his own non-MAGA GOP colleagues) that his priority was keeping the border problems alive — not solving them — so that the GOP presidential frontrunner Trump could use the border as a Biden vulnerability in his campaign.
Johnson told reporters today that “we have to actually solve problems and not just take political posturing as has happened.” He did not say specifically which political posturing he was referring to.
