House Speaker Mike Johnson, hobbled by a one-vote majority and dogged by a small band of disgruntled archconservatives who want to fire him, is determined to defy his critics and remain speaker in the next Congress.
He is also adamant that he is incrementally advancing a conservative agenda while battling a Democratic-run Senate and White House, though his Republican opponents accuse him of succumbing to liberal Washington’s status quo.
“My plan is to lead this conference to victory, and that won’t just be in the election cycle but in the days that follow,” Mr. Johnson said in an interview with The Washington Times.
The Louisiana Republican, 52, has been speaker for a little more than six months and is already facing an effort to oust him. Three hard-line House Republicans say he has capitulated to Democrats and has moved the House Republicans to the left on major legislation, most recently a foreign aid package that provided $61 billion to Ukraine but did not include a dime of U.S. border security funding.
Mr. Johnson insisted that he remains a faithful Reagan conservative. He is moving Republican priorities forward as far as possible, he said, and is aiming for “incremental wins” that keep the government functioning and addressing critical national security issues, even if it means working with Democrats.
“This is not the time for Hail Mary passes,” Mr. Johnson said in the interview. “I’d rather get most of what I want and go over the cliff with a flag waving. And that’s the situation we’re in. I think some of my colleagues don’t fully appreciate that.”
Many Republicans say they have landed hardly any policy wins they hoped their majority would deliver under Mr. Johnson, especially in combating the illegal immigration crisis at the southern border and curtailing runaway government spending that has led to crippling inflation and high interest rates.
The speaker defended the legislation he has passed, including the funding for Ukraine. He called it a “fateful decision” influenced by military generals who warned him that Ukraine would run out of ammunition to defend itself against invading Russia and would create a national security threat for the U.S.
Congressional Democrats and President Biden would have blocked an effort to link the aid to border security funding and policies, he said.
“Many of us didn’t feel it was right to empower our adversaries who were engaging in wars in which we have a direct national security interest, just because President Biden refuses to secure the southern border,” Mr. Johnson said.
Tough border security, he said, stands a much better chance of becoming law if Donald Trump wins the presidency in November.
Expanding the Republican majority and winning the Senate and the White House is where Republicans should focus, not on trying to oust him from the speakership.
“I think the vast majority of my Republican colleagues agree that it’s not a recipe for conservative policy. It’s a recipe for chaos, and I don’t think anybody wants to engage in that right now,” Mr. Johnson said.
He hasn’t spoken with his staunchest Republican opponent, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, who plans to call up the motion next week to remove him from the speaker’s dais.
Although all but two or three Republicans are likely to vote to block Ms. Greene, the Republicans’ one-seat majority means Mr. Johnson can survive only if some Democrats vote with Republicans.
Three top Democrats, including Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York, announced this week that they would save Mr. Johnson by providing bipartisan support in a vote to block Ms. Greene.
Although it may keep him in the job, Ms. Greene and Rep. Thomas Massie, Kentucky Republican, say the unprecedented backing of Democrats will amount to “sharing power” with Mr. Jeffries and other Democrats and will weaken him politically.
Mr. Johnson brushed aside their warning.
“I’m not discussing any kind of arrangement with any Democrats,” Mr. Johnson said. “All this is being done on their part, spontaneously.”
He thinks Democrats, like the vast majority of Republicans, want to stave off a repeat of October, when eight Republicans voted with all Democrats to remove Speaker Kevin McCarthy. The speakerless House was forced to shut down for three weeks while Republicans fought over a successor before elevating Mr. Johnson, a leadership backbencher elected to Congress in 2017.
The way Mr. Johnson interprets their support, Democrats are willing to vote for him to keep the House operating.
“They see it as virtually everyone does on our side: that the country desperately needs a functioning Congress right now. When the world is in such a dangerous moment — we have hot wars around the world and all the unrest on campuses and other problems — none of us believe that we can afford to have the House in chaos. And I think that’s what’s driving all of this.”
Mr. Johnson also spoke to The Times about a House effort to pass legislation to quell the rise of antisemitism that has been allowed to proliferate on college campuses, in some cases blocking Jewish students from campus or putting them in danger.
He has directed House committees to examine ways federal policy can help force colleges and universities to crack down on campus antisemitism. Revoking the tax-exempt status of wealthy college endowments is on the table, he said.
“That’s a major topic of discussion and analysis right now,” Mr. Johnson said. “And I can tell you that there’s an appetite to do something about that. We’re going to look at every legal and legislative angle that we have.”