Newly crowned House Speaker Mike Johnson endorsed former President Donald Trump’s White House return Tuesday as he grapples with howling from his right flank over government funding.
“I have endorsed him wholeheartedly. Look, I was one of the closest allies that President Trump had in Congress,” Johnson (R-La.) told CNBC’s “Squawk Box.” “He had a phenomenal first term those first two years.”
“We brought about the greatest economic numbers in the history of the world, not just the country, because his policies worked and I’m all in for President Trump,” Johnson continued. “I expect he’ll be our nominee, yeah, and he’s gonna win it and we have to make Biden a one-term president.”
Johnson’s predecessor, former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has maintained a friendly rapport with Trump, but has so far declined to endorse him in the midst of the primary.
Instead, McCarthy, a frequent guest on “Squawk Box,” publicly highlighted Trump’s standing in the race, stressing last week that the former president is “stronger today than he was in 2016.”
Johnson has backed Trump in past elections and served on his impeachment defense team during both trials in the Senate.
When pressed about the 77-year-old’s election denialism, Johnson downplayed Trump’s controversial rhetoric.
“Listen, there are a lot of people in Washington who’s saying things that are not accurate all the time,” Johnson said. “Everybody does. We’re all human.”
However, the speaker insisted that he believes Trump is sincere in his belief that the 2020 election was stolen from him.
“What he believes about that — that is deep in his heart. I mean, I’ve talked to him personally about it. Many of us have,” Johnson went on. “And I think that’s a core conviction of his.”
Trump refrained from explicitly endorsing Johnson for speaker, though he nudged Republicans into backing him last month.
“I am not going to make an Endorsement in this race, because I COULD NEVER GO AGAINST ANY OF THESE FINE AND VERY TALENTED MEN,” Trump posted on Truth Social last month.
“My strong SUGGESTION is to go with the leading candidate, Mike Johnson, & GET IT DONE, FAST!”
Johnson finds himself wrestling with a similar situation on government funding to the one that led to McCarthy’s ouster.
To avert a partial government shutdown at 11:59 p.m. Friday, Johnson has proposed a two-step “laddered CR” that would keep the government open until next year.
Under his plan, part of the government will be funded until Jan. 19 and the rest until Feb. 2. This gives Congress two deadlines to fund the government on a more permanent basis for the fiscal year.
But numerous Republican hard-liners have balked at the proposal, aghast at the lack of spending cuts attached to it. As a result, Johnson will likely have to lean on Democratic support to wrangle it through.
“It’s a real innovation. It’s a paradigm shift for how Washington works. But what that will do is allow us to actually have those fights,” Johnson said.
The speaker underscored that his plan will prevent the holiday crunch that Congress often undergoes to finish off the appropriations process.
“We have a shutdown looming and we’ve got to prevent that because that would do even more harm to the economy,” Johnson warned.