I think this goes here. Fuck Yeah! Let's do this!
Get ready to become roadkill, rubes!
Last Thursday, House Speaker Mike Johnson briefly considered abstaining from the fracas over whether the House Ethics Committee should release its report into alleged sexual misconduct by former Rep. Matt Gaetz. “The speaker is not involved with what happens in Ethics,” Johnson said. “Lots of important reasons for that.”
Apparently, those important reasons were more malleable than he’d originally thought. By Friday, Johnson had changed his mind.
“I’m going to strongly request that the Ethics Committee not issue the report, because that is not the way we do things in the House, and I think that would be a terrible precedent to set,” Johnson told reporters. “If someone is no longer a member of Congress, we are not in the business of investigating and publishing reports about people who are not part of this institution.”
In a Fox News Sunday interview yesterday, Johnson added that he was afraid releasing the Gaetz report—which they’ve been working on for years and which Gaetz transparently resigned from Congress in the hopes of avoiding—would “open a Pandora’s box.” Soon feral packs of Ethics Committee members will be roaming the streets of D.C., opening up investigations into anybody!
As faux-principled stands go, this is the House equivalent of Mitch McConnell’s 2021 argument that, while Donald Trump’s January 6th antics hadn’t been great, the Senate simply couldn’t convict an ex-president. If you think Johnson would have similar scruples if the committee were sitting on information potentially damaging to one of Trump’s enemies, I’ve got a bridge to sell you.
This patented brand of “doing whatever Trump wants while working hard to spin it as the dictates of my conscience” has gotten Johnson pretty far in life. Hell, after the vice president, he’s next in line for the presidency.
That role has also helped Trump tremendously, too. The skittish normies of the MAGA coalition cling to guys like Johnson as if they were a security blanket. Johnson’s mouthing of words like “tradition” and “precedent” allows them to go on believing, in the face of all evidence, that there’s still more to their party than transactionalism and raw power, even as Johnson himself engages in transactionalism for the pursuit of raw power.
As Trump prepares his triumphal return to power, though, Johnson is already much diminished. When the strongman arrives, the supposed normie proceduralist must meekly get out of the way.
Over the weekend, Johnson tagged along with Team Trump to a UFC match. A bunch of deeply funny pictures followed: Johnson leaning awkwardly into frame as Trump sat down to lunch with RFK Jr., Don Jr., and Elon Musk; Johnson bobbing at the heels of Trump and UFC CEO Dana White as they walked into the arena; Johnson craning his neck over Kid Rock’s shoulder to make it into an elevator selfie. The speaker of the House is just happy to be included. He knows who’s really in charge.