Marjorie Taylor Greene reveals enemy Mike Johnson made ‘a lot of excuses’ during their 70-minute peace talks. Will she continue her efforts to oust the Speaker?
- The pair tried to hash out their differences for an hour and ten minutes on Wednesday. “We didn’t walk away with a deal,” Greene said
- Greene’s meeting with Johnson came just as another vote on the rule — this time to advance the controversial spying tool FISA — failed in the House of Representatives
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said Speaker Mike Johnson gave her “a lot of apologies” at a meeting and did not back down from her threat to attempt to oust him.
“We discussed the omnibus and I explained all the reasons why he failed as our speaker as Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, he funded the Biden administration and their open borders policy,” the Georgia Republican said.
“This will not be tolerated by Republicans and it is not the way to win elections because Republican voters will not vote for a Democratic agenda. “I have a lot of excuses as to why that happened,” she said.
Greene launched the motion to break up the government after Johnson passed three continuing resolutions, or CRs, that funded the government at fiscal 2023 levels before approving a pair of packages costing $1.6 trillion to close the government in 2024 to fund.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said Speaker Mike Johnson gave her “a lot of excuses” at a meeting and has not backed down on her threat to launch a bid to oust him.
She did not immediately force a vote on the issue, but meant it as a “warning” and a “pink slip.”
The pair tried to hash out their differences for an hour and ten minutes on Wednesday. “We didn’t walk away with a deal,” she said.
Greene’s meeting with Johnson came just as another rule vote — this time to advance the controversial spying tool FISA — failed in the House of Representatives.
She said she “made it clear” to the speaker that pushing through the FISA reauthorization and aid to Ukraine could further jeopardize his job — even as she said she “cares too much about the majority” to commit to maintain any red line for carrying out its threat.
“I haven’t red-lined him and I’ve been very attentive to my conference,” Greene said.
“I have no doubt he prayed every day to do the right thing,” she joked. “But he hasn’t done the job we chose him to do.”
Greene said she warned Johnson that “he will be personally responsible for finding this continued murder of people in a foreign country that is not a NATO ally of ours, and that the American people do not support.”
She also said Johnson offered her an advisory role on his team.
“He discussed having a kitchen, a kitchen pantry, a group that would be a group of advisors for him, asked me if I was interested, and I said I’d wait to see what his proposal is on that,” Greene told reporters. . ‘Right now he doesn’t have my support. I’m watching what’s happening with FISA and Ukraine. Those are the two things we’ll pay attention to.’
Greene launched the motion to vacate after Johnson passed three continuing resolutions, or CRs, that funded the government at fiscal 2023 levels before approving a pair of packages costing $1.6 trillion to fund the government through 2024 .
Johnson could now shelve the FISA bill again — meaning he won’t need all of his Republicans to pass a rule, but he’ll need two-thirds of the House of Representatives to pass a final bill .
This could further confuse Johnson’s opponents and push them into the arms of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s motion to eliminate the threat.
If Greene were to bring her motion to evict to the floor, there would be a vote to oust Johnson from the speakership, which would require only a small handful of Republicans to sign on, if all Democrats were to vote again to pass a Republican speaker to boot.
A senior Republican Party staffer told DailyMail.com that there is a “strong” chance that anti-FISA law Republicans would embrace the motion to kill the bill (MTV) if Johnson returns the bill to the floor under suspension would lay.
“Suspending it is another slap in the face to the members who are already thinking about MTV.”
Whether Greene follows through on her measure to impeach Johnson because of FISA or IKRaine remains to be seen.
They and like-minded conservatives have warned the speaker not to bring up foreign aid funding for Ukraine before a vote, saying the U.S. border crisis must be addressed first before money can be doled out to wars abroad.
But the pleas from the White House, Ukrainian President Zelensky, the Democrats and moderate Republicans to vote on aid to the controversial country also put Johnson in a difficult position.