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Home Speaker Mike Johnson gathered with Donald Trump for the primary time since taking the gavel as the 2 attended an occasion at Mar-a-Lago held by Florida Rep. Rep. Gus Bilirakis.
The brand new speaker publicly endorsed Trump’s 2024 presidential bid final week when he informed CNBC’s Squawk Field program: ‘I am all in for President Trump.’
On Monday night the previous president and Johnson attended Bilirakis’ fundraiser at Trump’s swanky Palm Seashore, Florida, membership Mar-a-Lago.
Johnson was fundraising in Florida when he made the cease at Trump’s property, which doubles as his residence.
On October 25, Johnson discovered himself ascending from a rank-and-file member of the Home of Representatives to the brand new Home Speaker after Rep. Kevin McCarthy’s ouster and weeks of chaos amongst Republicans choosing his alternative.
<img id="i-9001963c32c902d5" src="https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2023/11/21/14/78060435-12775213-image-a-16_1700577125129.jpg" top="582" width="306" alt="Speaker Mike Johnson waits to talk on the People March for Israel rally on the Nationwide Mall on November 14″ class=”blkBorder img-share” />
Home Speaker Mike Johnson (left) met with former President Donald Trump (proper) at Mar-a-Lago throughout a Monday night time fundraiser, in keeping with a number of reviews
Johnson, a religious Christian, wasn’t at all times a Trump backer – however he did play a key function in his bid to overturn the 2020 presidential election outcomes.
The brand new speaker’s endorsement and assembly with Trump appears to indicate he is determining that he wants Trump in his nook if Home Republicans have any likelihood of retaining their slim majority within the decrease chamber.
‘I count on he’ll [Trump] be our nominee, and now we have to make [President Joe] Biden a one-term president,’ Johnson informed CNBC final week, including he is one of many ‘closest allies President Trump has in Congress.’
Trump, who’s going through greater than 90 felony counts in legal instances spanning 4 states, is the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican major.
Rep. Bilirakis (R-Fla.) was holding the occasion at Trump’s membership on Monday night time the place Johnson and the ex-president met.
Johnson was one of many lawmakers who voted in opposition to certifying the 2020 election outcomes.
He additionally performed a key function in serving to garner assist for the amicus temporary backing a longshot lawsuit by Texas officers trying to again Trump’s 2020 Electoral School depend problem.
The ex-president and Home Speaker had been gathered at a fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago hosted by Florida Rep. Gus Bilirakis on Monday night
Fairly how a lot Johnson’s final Tuesday endorsement helps Trump stays to be seen.
Speaker Johnson was little identified earlier than being elevated to the submit of speaker final month and nonetheless has scant title recognition past Washington’s political circles.
And he delivered his endorsement on the day it emerged that he as soon as condemned Trump on Fb.
‘The factor about Donald Trump is that he lacks the character and the ethical heart we desperately want once more within the White Home,’ Johnson wrote in 2015 in posts discovered by the New York Instances.
His phrases had been challenged within the feedback and he responded: ‘I’m afraid he would break extra issues than he fixes. He’s a sizzling head by nature, and that may be a harmful trait to have in a commander in chief.’
On the time, Johnson was a lawmaker in Louisiana.
He went on to wonder if Trump would possibly bomb a head-of-state merely for displaying him disrespect.
‘I’m solely midway kidding about this,’ he wrote. ‘I simply do not assume he has the demeanor to be president.’
Johnson just isn’t alone in altering tack when it suited him.
Trump’s administration was crammed with officers who backed different candidates in 2016 or had been brazenly hostile to him.
And Johnson went on serve on Trump’s protection staff in the course of the president’s first impeachment trial.
‘Throughout his 2016 marketing campaign, President Trump rapidly gained me and thousands and thousands of my fellow Republicans over,’ Johnson informed the New York Instances in response.
‘Once I received to know him personally shortly after we each arrived in Washington in 2017, I grew to understand the person who he’s and the qualities about him that made him the extraordinary president that he was.’
In his CNBC interview, he additionally defended Trump’s stance on the 2020 election.
Trump ‘simply felt like he was cheated within the final election,’ he stated.
Democrats had been fast to spotlight ‘MAGA Mike’s’ hardline positions.
Democratic Nationwide Committee spokesperson Sarafina Chitika stated: ‘MAGA Mike Johnson sees in Trump one other anti-abortion, election-denying extremist who will do every part in his energy to pursue a radical, anti-freedom agenda if he is reelected president.
‘Although MAGA Mike as soon as confessed that he thought Trump was ‘harmful’ and ‘unfit’ to serve, he is so hellbent on legislating away People’ freedoms and gutting Social Safety and Medicare that he is keen to endorse Trump anyway.’
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