It took three weeks, three nominees, and a great deal of political strife and infighting to break the stalemate, but the U.S. House has finally elected its new speaker.
That new speaker of the House is Louisiana Rep. Mike Johnson.
The Republican congressman isn’t someone whose face is often splashed across the front pages of national news outlets. The 51-year-old is currently serving his fourth term as the representative for the 4th District of Louisiana, which is composed of localities in the northwestern part of the state, including the cities of Shreveport, Minden, DeRidder, and Natchitoches.
While he’s maintained a pretty low profile, Johnson is known for political positions that are deeply connected to his ultraconservative religious views. He boasts strong opposition to abortion and LGBTQ+ rights and has advocated for prayer in public schools.
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Additionally, not only has he backed the false claims that the 2020 election was rigged, but he even went to great lengths to garner enough House GOP support to advance an amicus brief supporting a Texas lawsuit that would invalidate the election results in key states. He even served ceremoniously on Donald Trump’s legal team for both of the former president’s impeachment trials.
With all that in mind, it isn’t surprising that his record doesn’t show any concerted efforts to advance the interests of Black Americans, especially in regard to legislative proposals that are high-profile topics of discussion among Black communities.
In 2019, he said that he didn’t support reparations at a subcommittee hearing, stating that repayments to descendants of enslaved Americans would “almost certainly be unconstitutional on their face.”
“I don’t think reparations for something that happened 150 years ago, for whom none of us currently living are responsible, is a good idea,” Johnson said. “We tried to deal with our original sin of slavery by fighting a Civil War, by passing landmark civil rights legislation. We’ve elected an African-American president. I don’t think we should be trying to figure out how to compensate for it.”
He even used a Black child that he and his wife “took in” when the child was 14 to attempt to exemplify that he knows the struggles of discrimination.
“I personally know the challenges he has faced early in his life. I’ve walked with him through discrimination that he’s had to endure over the years and the hurdles he faced,” the lawmaker said.
Unsurprisingly, his take was met with boos and jeers from the crowd.
Last year, he argued against advocacy of racial equity during a House Judiciary Committee hearing on discrimination against Muslim, Arab, and South Asian American communities, stating that “equal treatment and equal opportunity are the foundation of civil rights laws.”
“Some advocates today are pushing for what amounts to a drastic departure from our traditional notions of racism and discrimination and equality as have exsited in American law for decades and generations. Instead of equality of treatment and equal opportunity, these advocates are pushing for what we now call ‘equity.’ Rather than non-discrimination, equity requires explicit discrimination to achieve an equitable distribution of outcomes. Perversely, these ideas have caused discrimination against some of the communities that are the subject of today’s hearing.”
On Tuesday, Republicans were working to make Minnesota Rep. Tom Emmer their new speaker. He dropped out of the race hours after being voted the GOP nominee because he couldn’t secure enough support on the House floor. Not a full day passed before House Republicans settled on Johnson as their new man.
The party was playing a political tug-of-war over which member would be best suited to take the seat. Hardliners weren’t budging over their desire to elect someone who would prioritize their budget agenda and wouldn’t mind playing ball with defending Trump as the embattled former president grapples with several criminal indictments. Moderates wanted someone who could move ahead with spending deals that ousted speaker Kevin McCarthy made with President Joe Biden.
Weeks of back-and-forth, secret and open ballots, failed nominees, and closed-door meetings finally led them to settle on Johnson, who was backed by several stalwart conservatives. Speaker hopefuls preceding Johnson included Steve Scalise, Jim Jordan, and Emmer.
Now that the House has a speaker, legislative efforts can continue to bolster support in global conflicts like the Russia-Ukraine war and the battles between Israel and Palestine. Congress will also have to vote on a budget deal ahead of a looming government shutdown on Nov. 17.
