Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene and Thomas Massie have announced their plans to file a Motion to Vacate the Speaker of the House. But Democrats, under the leadership of Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, have promised to block the attempt. So, would trying to oust Speaker Mike Johnson actually HELP the Democrats? Glenn asked Rep. Thomas Massie to defend his reasoning for ousting Johnson before the election. Massie lays out the 3 “betrayals” he believes Johnson has committed and what he believes Jeffries is really plotting.
TranscriptBelow is a rush transcript that may contain errors
GLENN: You can say a lot of things about Thomas Massie. Some of them true, some of them false.
But the one thing that is absolutely true. He stands on his own principles.
And he is unwavering. In those principles. He joins us now. From the great state of Kentucky.
Republican representative. Thomas Massie. Hello, Thomas.
TOM: How are you doing, Glenn?
GLENN: I'm very good. I'm very good. I don't understand this whole Mike Johnson thing, as Speaker of the House. I don't understand what happened to him. How we went so wrong. You know, people are saying, that, oh, this has been a scam forever. He's been, you know, a RINO and just in hiding. And now, getting rid of him at this point. What good is that going to do? Or even moving from this, because do you have the numbers to do it?
TOM: Great questions. Let me talk about how we got to where we are.
GLENN: Okay.
TOM: So Mike Johnson has betrayed us three times. Big betrayals. He did an omnibus bill, that did does and he gave the FBI a brand-new bill in that omnibus bill. And he didn't give us time to read it. He gave up on doing 12 separate bills.
That was the first betrayal. Second betrayal, FISA. This is the spying program that's been used to surveil Americans without a warrant. He cast the deciding vote on whether to have warrants or not.
And he voted against warrants.
This is against what he stood for, when he was on the judiciary committee, that I serve on. With Jim Jordan.
So something has changed there. He said he spent time in a skiff, that changed his time. Guess what, Glenn. I don't know if your listeners know this. I spent three and a half hours with him, to get him briefed by CIA, NSA, DOD, FBI, and DNI, and a FISA judge.
And in three a half hours. They didn't give us a specific example. Not one, of how spying on Americans, without a warrant, has helped them stop terrorism, to give them hypotheticals. But no example.
So that was the second betrayal. No warrants. Now, you can still be spied on.
It's reauthorized. Third betrayal. Just happened. This one we're still stinging from.
You may see the videos of every Democrat in the House voted for. For Ukraine.
Premeditated. Passed out Ukrainian flags. And basically humiliating us.
And I think speaker Johnson. If he's capable of having shame at this point. Should have been humiliated by that display as well.
I put the video of that on Twitter. And a search told me they would fine me $500 if I didn't take it down. So I reposted it.
(music)
Because look, you're not supposed to put video of what's happening on the floor. But that was video of things that were breaking decorum. Right? I was trying to provide evidence that they were in the wrong. And instead of prosecuting them, they came after me.
GLENN: Sure.
NEIL: Now, we got 8 million views on the video after I reposted it, and Speaker Johnson backed down on that fine because he knew how bad that looked. So third betrayal. Was that, you know, Ukrainian vote, where send the money overseas. We gave up all leverage on any border security.
They included some other bad stuff in it.
GLENN: Let's talk about the $4 billion to help people from the Middle East immigrate here to the United States. Including Palestinians.
Are you nuts?
NEIL: Yeah. And you see, Mike Johnson will not stand up against that.
By the way, those three bills that I just mentioned to you. You know what happened when they went to the Senate. After they passed the House. Chuck Schumer didn't even change the punctuation of any of those bills.
He must want any amendments to them. He wanted them exactly as Mike Johnson wanted them in the house.
Because those were Chuck Schumer's bills that Mike Johnson put on the floor.
He's already in the arms of the union party. The question you rightfully ask: Is why do this? Well, the people are always asking me, Thomas. Can you show us. Can you give us a list, of the good guys and the bad guys. Can you tell me who the good guys are. I have a primary. I have a vote in. I have a general election. Tell me the list. This list. You will have another list, we keep doing this. At great peril to ourselves.
The reason there's only a few of them that are willing to stand up and call this. Is because you put -- you put your reputation on the line. And people here hate transparency. They hate us for doing it. You will have the list next week. When the motion to vacate is called. Of who went to the king Jeffries. And the Uniparty to keep Mike Johnson in power.
King Jeffries, the reason he's supporting Mike Johnson, he got everything the Democrats want, without any of the blowback by having Mike Johnson as speaker. And they also -- they have some claims for other things.
They may resettle Palestinian refugees in the United States. And pay for it. They may want to make the funding for Ukraine permanent.
And before our next election, there's going to be another CR or omnibus or something.
That's coming September 30. So some people are like, well, why would you do this now, Congressman Massie?
Hasn't all the bad stuff -- hasn't Mike already done all the bad stuff to us?
Can't we just sit it out to the next election?
No. Because what Hakeem Jeffries wants more than anything is to be the speaker, and the only way he becomes the speaker is by getting the majority of the House in November.
And he knows Mike Johnson is the most uninspiring speaker we've ever had.
It will not do anything to inspire -- most likely to lose the majority under speaker Johnson.
GLENN: So what would the plan B. If you could get this to pass. I mean, well, first of all.
Let me ask you.
How many -- how many other Freedom Caucus members are standing with you?
NEIL: Well, I think before Hakeem Jeffries came out for Speaker Johnson. There were probably somewhere between 12 and 20 who didn't want to speak, but would have voted with us.
Now, I think, you may have maybe the entire Freedom Caucus. We'll see.
I know people outside of the Freedom Caucus.
Who said, if one Democrat votes to keep Mike Johnson. I ain't voting to keep him.
Because they know what that means. That means it's the Uniparty.
Now, the first vote will be on a motion to table. To try and prevent this from even coming up for appear actual vote. But people should understand, that is -- that motion to table, if they succeed. That is the only vote that will happen. And that is your list there.
Are those the people who saved Mike Johnson. Which Hakeem Jeffries. And all the Democrat leadership, said they'll do it. And some Democrat ranking file. There are some Republicans, who sit at the table. But that will be the vote. Now, if we could succeed.
Okay. If we could get past that motion to table. And maybe Hakeem Jeffries has only 40 Democrats, who are willing to walk the plank. I can imagine that will be tough for them and their primaries. Unless they're planning on retiring. Can you imagine? You've saved the Christian speaker, who is against abortion, and all this other stuff. And what's the -- anyways.
So I don't -- I'm not sure how many votes Hakeem has. But I think he helped us grow our numbers. Let's say we help them pass that vote. There is a motion to vacate. And Mike Johnson is vacating. At that point, who would we elect?
Well, we would like for Mike Johnson to avoid the scenario, I just described.
We're giving him a weekend to resign.
If he would announce that he's leaving, like John Boehner did in ten weeks.
And he won't be offended as we have votes to replace him while he's still speaker. We could go without ever not having a speaker.
We could keep doing subpoenas, and the judiciary committees. We could have hearings and pass all these wonderful old messaging bills that they love to pass. But if that doesn't happen, we'll have to elect a Speaker. We will be on the spot.
I think there are a dozen people, in the G.O.P. conference. Who have something in their entire life.
Whether it's political experience. Or prior experience nap qualifies them for the job.
Mike Johnson is a lost ball in tall weeds. I don't think there's some conspiracy, where they've got kids locked in the basement. Or something like that.
I don't think they have info on him, or blackmail material. I just don't think he can do the job.
And there's nothing in his life that prepared him for that. Let's find someone that can. Hopefully that will inspire people to keep them in the majority. Even Hakeem Jeffries bails Mike Johnson out, next week. They're not going to bail him out in January.
We know he's a lame duck speaker.
But he knows it. Let's get him out of there, before he causes any more mischief.
GLENN: What did McCarthy do better than Johnson?
NEIL: Oh, that's a great question. Under McCarthy, we did seven of the 12 bills. Okay. There's 12 separate bills. He said, we'll do an omnibus. We got seven of the 12. We got 7 of the 12 done. We had a thousand amendments. I'm not on the rules committee. We got votes on a thousand amendments to allow rank-and-file members to participate in the legislative process. When Mike Johnson came on board, he did two or three CRs. He ignored the 7 bills we had done. He made no effort to do the other five. And he said, you will get a two-part omnibus.
That was the bad thing.
The second thing, well, Kevin McCarthy could have cut a deal with the Democrats. And could have been still speaker now.
He said, I will not do it.
The position is not that important to me.
We will make a Uniparty here, and share power. So that's another thing that Mike Johnson has expressed a willingness to do.
That Kevin wouldn't do. And finally, as a part of the debt limit deal, this last summer.
Kevin extracted, from Joe Biden, and Chuck Schumer.
This is signed into law. And still law. That if you do a CR. And it goes past April 30th.
Basically, halfway through the fiscal year. There's a 1 percent cut.
And Kevin secured that from Joe Biden.
Mike onset had three choices, on the spending bills. When he came into office.
He could use the 1 percent cut option. He could have worked on the five other bills. Or he could have duplicate the omnibus.
He actually could have done the 1 percent cut option. That Kevin had secured.
And spent a lot of political capital on getting that provision in law.
So those are three things that Kevin did that Mike didn't.
And Kevin, put through of us on the rules committee.
That gave us a blocking position. Chip Roy, Ralph Norman, and myself. And we used that for good. We forced the 72-hour rule for the entire time Kevin was speaker. That's another thing Johnson threw out the window.
You don't always get three days to read a bill now. He's overriding his own rules committee. And he's going with Democrats to do it.
GLENN: Do you think this was -- you know, I write in some place.
You know, this was planned from the beginning. He's been lying in wait, trying to pretend that he was part of the Freedom Caucus for years.
Do you believe that?
ANN: Yeah. You know, what really confused me. Is the readiness with which, sort of the big spenders in Washington, DC.
Where they accepted Mike Johnson as a valid speaker candidate. After defeating Jim Jordan multiple times.
They found Jim Jordan unsuitable. But they found this junior member very unsuitable to the job, who had no experience. You know, had never been a chairman. Didn't have much staff.
And I think at that point, they got some assurance from Mike Johnson. That he -- or some feeling, that Mike Johnson would be a good guy to carry the water for the establishment here in DC.
And that's exactly what he's done.
GLENN: Hmm. Well, Thomas, when do you file? Is this Monday?
NEIL: Probably what will happen is we'll file Monday. Speaker Johnson, because it's a privileged resolution. The only thing that has higher privilege is motion to adjourn.
So he will have two days. Two legislative days to bring it up. So if we file it on Monday. The vote will either be Monday immediately. Or Tuesday or Wednesday.
If we file it on Tuesday. It would be either on Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday. Would be the vote.
GLENN: You don't believe he will back away?
I mean, you put this, or Marjorie Taylor Greene did. She put this in line, to be brought up, as kind of a threat.
Hey, we're thinking about doing this. Don't push it.
And he did it anyway.
NEIL: That's right. So he called the bluff, and we're calling the bluff. And we will have this vote.
What I hope, Glenn, is that our conference chair. Our Whip. And our Majority Floor Leader would go to Mike Johnson.
We exhibit the leadership, that we put them on that team to exhibit. And say, Mike, it's over.
It's just not worth what you're doing.
You're going and partnering with Hakeem Jeffries. And the minority whip, and the minority conference chair.
We can't do that. So I would like to see them go, convince Mike Johnson as a team.
It's time for him to step aside. He could still do that.
And I know as improbable as it sounds. And as resolved as Mike Johnson seems when he gets to the podium. That's exactly how John Boehner was, until the five minutes he took to resign.
STU: Thomas, I know we only have about a minute left. But if the concern is that, you know, Johnson will work with Jeffries, when he's put up against the wall and do these things.
If you go forward with this, you're making Johnson's political life, dependent on Hakeem Jeffries saving. I mean, couldn't this potentially just make all of this worse?
NEIL: It's very painful to expose this. I think what we're illuminating. I don't think we're causing him to go in that direction. We're illuminating what actually exists in Washington, DC. And why you don't get the results you want.
Is because he's already in league with Chuck Schumer, Mitch McConnell, and Hakeem Jeffries.
And we're just illuminating what would be otherwise, I believe.
GLENN: Thomas, God bless you.
Thank you for standing up for your principles. Whether people agree or disagree with, you know, you and your stance.
I will tell you, that I have a lot of respect for somebody who will take the heat, because they won't sit down on their principles.
Thank you.
NEIL: Well, thanks, Glenn. People say, this is a lost cause. You shouldn't do it. People didn't elect us to give up. People elected us to try. And that's what we're doing.
GLENN: Thank you so much. Appreciate it.