Sens. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) and Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) got in a confrontation Wednesday with Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) after they staged a surprise press gaggle outside his office to highlight their health care demands and his delay in swearing in Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva (D-Ariz.).
“The guy who works in this office right here is keeping all of his Republican colleagues and his caucus on an extended summer vacation. He will not come back to negotiate with us. We are ready,” Kelly told reporters outside Johnson’s office, referring to Democrats wanting commitments on health care measures as a condition of voting to reopen the government.
Gallego dug in on Johnson not swearing in Grijalva, who would be the final signature needed on a discharge petition to force a vote on a bill to release files relating to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Gallego accused the Speaker of wanting to “cover up for pedophiles on the Epstein list.”
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Johnson canceled previously scheduled House votes this week as he aims to pressure Senate Democrats into passing a House-passed, GOP-crafted stopgap to fund the government. Though he has previously sworn in members during pro forma House sessions on House voting days, he has said he will not swear in Grijalva until the House is back voting.
“There’s a way for all of us to actually get things done, protect the government workers, extend these affordable health care tax credits — but not when Johnson’s keeping his people out of session, and certainly not while he’s keeping a duly elected member of Congress from Arizona that should have been sworn in by all standards by now,” Gallego said.
Several minutes into the Arizona Democrats answering reporter questions about the shutdown, Johnson came out of his office — surprising the senators and joining the gaggle.
He first addressed the demand to swear in Grijalva.
“We’re going to do that as soon as we get back to work, but we need the lights turned back on, so we encourage both of you to go open the government,” Johnson told Kelly and Gallego.
Johnson told them that a situation in which he swore in two Florida members the day after their special election in April was different because it had been previously scheduled and their families were in town.
“Grijalva has not yet had a scheduled date because she was elected after the House was out of session,” Johnson said. “So, I am anxious to administer the oath to her.”
Gallego said Johnson did not want Grijalva to sign the Epstein discharge petition, to which Johnson replied it “has nothing to do” with Epstein, pointing to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee investigating the Epstein matter and the committee obtaining material from Epstein’s estate.
“This is an excuse so she doesn’t sign on to that,” Gallego said.
“This is absurd,” Johnson responded, adding: “This is a publicity stunt.”
Johnson said the senators were upset because they are getting “a lot of heat because the government’s closed down.”
Asked why he does not bring back Republicans to negotiate, Johnson said, “We’re going to have plenty of negotiations as soon as we open the government.”
Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) then jumped in to push back on the senators — and the lawmakers started to get more argumentative and talk over each other.
“Stop covering up for the pedophiles,” Gallego said at one point.
“Nobody’s covering up for pedophiles, so knock it the hell off,” Lawler shot back.
Fox News and NOTUS captured video of some of the exchange.
Johnson said Kelly and Gallego “had a publicity stunt here” but now “need to go and vote and reopen the government” and went back into his office.