Thursday, December 19

Tag: house speaker

Mike Johnson Spent Years Defending Christian Speech In Schools
24Nov By adminNo Comments
Politics

Mike Johnson Spent Years Defending Christian Speech In Schools

Before coming to Congress, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) spent years taking up lawsuits in defense of Christian speech and activities in public elementary schools and universities.Johnson, who was a relatively unknown Louisiana congressman before being elected House speaker last month, previously spent eight years as senior attorney for Alliance Defending Freedom, an evangelical legal group focused on dismantling LGBTQ+ rights and outlawing abortion. It was in his role there that Johnson, a constitutional lawyer, took up case after case aimed at chipping away at the separation of church and state.What’s alarming about this pattern in his background is that it raises questions about whether the House speaker ― the person second in line to the U.S. presidency ― disputes the first freedom gua...
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Controversy grows over GOP’s Israel-only aid plan
31Oct By adminNo Comments
Health

Controversy grows over GOP’s Israel-only aid plan

The Senate and the White House pushed back hard on Tuesday against new Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson’s plan to fund only aid for Israel — and include unrelated cuts to the Internal Revenue Service. Both Democrats and Republicans in the upper chamber said they would move ahead with a supplemental aid plan that would include billions in much-needed aid for embattled Ukraine alongside assistance for the Jewish state as it battles Hamas. “Make no mistake, we need to address all of these priorities as part of one package — because the reality is these issues are all connected, and they are all urgent,” said Sen. Patti Murray (D-Washington), chair of the appropriations committee. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell agreed with Democrats and President Biden to push for a combined pack...
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Republicans Hope The Chaos Of Recent Weeks Will Become A Distant Memory In Next Year’s Elections
28Oct By adminNo Comments
Politics

Republicans Hope The Chaos Of Recent Weeks Will Become A Distant Memory In Next Year’s Elections

WASHINGTON (AP) — “Embarrassing,” “chaotic” and “irresponsible.” And those were just the words that House Republicans used to describe the past three weeks as they removed one speaker from office and splintered over three successive nominees before finally landing on Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La.Now they hope voters won’t hold the GOP’s infighting against them as they seek to hold onto their exceedingly narrow House majority in next year’s election.Republicans already had a tough task on their hands. They can afford to lose only four seats to maintain the majority, and 18 of their incumbents are running in districts won by President Joe Biden in 2020. A Supreme Court decision siding with Black voters in a redistricting lawsuit could give Democrats a pick-up opportunity in Alabama. And Republic...
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Speaker Mike Johnson Is Much More Troubling Than His Benign Appearance Suggests
26Oct By adminNo Comments
Politics

Speaker Mike Johnson Is Much More Troubling Than His Benign Appearance Suggests

Newly elected House Speaker Mike Johnson’s path in Republican politics began with a yearslong role as the senior attorney and national spokesperson for a group on the religious right dedicated to dismantling LGBTQ+ freedoms and outlawing abortion.Johnson worked for that organization, Alliance Defending Freedom, for eight years, from 2002 to 2010, before serving a brief stint as a Louisiana state legislator and then heading to Congress in 2017. He first became a known entity in his state in the late 1990s when he and his wife went on national television as the face of Louisiana’s new marriage covenant laws, which made it harder to get a divorce.The social conservative causes that have fueled Johnson’s rise, many of which are deeply unpopular with the American public, are already worrisome ...
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Mike Johnson is latest Republican pick for House Speaker
25Oct By adminNo Comments
Health

Mike Johnson is latest Republican pick for House Speaker

Rep. Mike Johnson has become the latest Republican pick for House Speaker after winning a majority vote of the deeply divided House caucus. The Louisiana hardliner said he plans to seek a vote on the House floor Wednesday even though it remained far from certain that he has the 217 Republican votes likely needed to win the gavel. Johnson becomes the fourth GOP leader to try his luck after Rep. Tom Emmer (R-Minnesota) withdrew his bid amid opposition from former President Donald Trump just a couple of hours after he defeated Johnson on Tuesday. Rep. Steve Scalise, the No. 2 House GOP leader, and Rep. Jim Jordan, a prominent MAGA extremist, both crashed and burned earlier amid fierce opposition from various factions in the House GOP. The chaos was sparked three weeks ago when a group of eig...
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Some Republicans Kept The House Shut Down Over Gay Marriage
25Oct By adminNo Comments
Politics

Some Republicans Kept The House Shut Down Over Gay Marriage

Minnesota Republican Rep. Tom Emmer’s support for legalizing gay marriage was a major reason his Tuesday tenure as the GOP’s speaker-designate lasted only four hours, a sign of how the extremism of the Republican Party is directly contributing to its now three-week-long struggle to elect a speaker. Emmer voted for the Respect for Marriage Act in 2022, which turned the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2015 ruling legalizing gay marriage into national law. His vote, which came after years of opposing gay marriage, put him in line with the overwhelming majority of Americans: Earlier this year, Gallup found that 71% of Americans support gay marriage, an all-time high. This mainstream position ― one shared by 39 other House Republicans at the time ― was too much to overcome for at least a handful of membe...
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