Major update (three charts added below to the above two) that shows just how extreme Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) truly is - it is very worrisome to say the least.
The original post follows:
Meet Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) – the newly-elected GOP House
Speaker in this article from BUSINESS INSIDER with their headline:
“Meet Rep.
Mike Johnson, the new speaker of the House who introduced the national version
of Florida's Don't Say Gay law and played
a key role in efforts to overturn the 2020 election”
FYI: Based on this article showing
who Johnson really that the general public did not know prior to him being
elected as GOP Speaker during the chaotic turmoil after then GOP Speaker Rep. Keven
McCarthy (R-CA) was booted out and Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) failed to replace him.
All that follows is based
on Johnson’s past statements and voting record that show to me at least that he
is possibly the worst speaker ever in our political history – cite the
following examples from the article that the public knew little about.
Background on
Johnson:
1. Like most of his GOP colleagues, Johnson voted against
certifying the 2020 election and EC results from AZ and PA even after a mob
ransacked the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
2. Johnson also was the lead organizer of an amicus
brief to the Supreme Court in support of a TX lawsuit asking the
court to halt the certification of the vote in GA, MI, PA, and WI.
3. The day after Joe Biden
was declared the winner of the 2020 election, Johnson said he called Trump and encouraged
him to “keep fighting. Twitter Source: @RepMikeJohnson November
7, 2020
4. On the morning of
January 6, he tweeted that Republicans “MUST fight for election integrity, the Constitution,
and the preservation of our republic!” Twitter Source: @RepMikeJohnson January
6, 2021
5. In October 2023, Johnson led over two dozen of his colleagues introducing the “Stop the Sexualization of Children Act of 2022.”
The bill is essentially the
national Ron DeSantis (R) version of his FL “Parental Rights in Education Law”
— also dubbed “Don't Say Gay.”
The Federal bill prohibits federal funds from being used to:
(1) Promote any sexually-oriented program, event, or literature for children
under the age of 10; and (2) bans federal funding from being used for drag
shows, or “Drag Queen Story Hour.” (FYI:
Drag Queen history here from National Geographic).
Johnson’s bill defines “Sexually-oriented
material” as any topic involving gender identity, gender dysphoria,
transgenderism, sexual orientation, or related subjects.”
Note: That led
the Human Rights Campaign to condemn
the bill as “the latest cruel attempt to stigmatize and marginalize
the community.”
6. Johnson since May 2022, has continually voted against sending aid to Ukraine and was among the original 57 Republicans who first did so.
He
said at the time: “We should not be sending another $40 billion
abroad when (1) our own border is in chaos, (2) American mothers are struggling
to find baby formula, (3) gas prices are at record highs, and (4) American
families are struggling to make ends meet, without sufficient oversight over
where the money will go.”
That means his ascent to
the speakership could imperil the future of U.S aid to the war-torn country,
which continues to rely on American assistance in its war against Russia.
Some more on Johnson’s evangelical background: There's little publicly-available information about Johnson's activities at Liberty University, and Business Insider has reached out to the University for details.
According to his
financial disclosures, Johnson made a decent chunk of change on the side
teaching online courses, including: More than $10,000 in 2018, more than
$26,000 in 2019 and 2020, and more than $29,000 in 2021 and 2022: Totaling some $122,485.00.
According to a biography on the website Answers in Genesis, Johnson has taught “Constitution and free enterprise” at the university's Helms School of Government.
Liberty University is a private evangelical Christian university in Lynchburg, Virginia founded by televangelist Jerry Falwell.
His son, Jerry Falwell Jr., ran the university
until he resigned amid a sex scandal in 2020 and he had been a prominent Trump
backer within the evangelical community.
A bit more on this
man: Johnson is one of the few Americans in a “covenant marriage,” a legal
arrangement that makes it harder for couples to get a divorce. He married his wife Kelly in 1999, and both of
them voluntarily opted into the arrangement.
Under Louisiana state law, couples sign a document in
which they agree to seek marital counseling before getting a divorce.
Additionally, couples can only get divorced on a limited set of grounds,
including for adultery, if one partner committed a felony or faces
imprisonment, or physical or sexual abuse.
Johnson told
ABC in 2005: “My wife and I both come from traditional Christian
households. My own parents are divorced. As anyone who goes through that knows,
that was a traumatic thing for our whole family. I'm a big proponent of
marriage and fidelity and all the things that go with it, and I've seen
firsthand the devastation [divorce] can cause. I think that it would be a
pretty big red flag if you asked your mate or your fiancé, 'Let's do a covenant
marriage,' and they said they don't really want to do that” (his wife Kelly also
told ABC).
Finally this from Johnson: As CNN's KFILE reported on Wednesday, Johnson once argued in favor of criminalizing gay sex writing in a July 2003 op-ed: “States have many legitimate grounds to proscribe same-sex deviate sexual intercourse. By closing these bedroom doors, they have opened a Pandora's box.”
At the time, Johnson worked at the Alliance Defense Fund, now known as Alliance Defending Freedom. That group wrote an amicus brief to the Supreme Court in the Lawrence v. Texas case in which the court overturned state-level bans on same-sex intercourse which Johnson had opposed.
He described
homosexuality as inherently unnatural and a dangerous lifestyle saying: “Homosexual
relationships are inherently unnatural and, the studies clearly show, are
ultimately Johnson wrote in a 2004 op-ed. Society cannot give its stamp of
approval to such a dangerous lifestyle. If we change marriage for this tiny,
modern minority, we will have to do it for every deviant group. Polygamists,
polyamorists, pedophiles, and others will be next in line to claim equal
protection. They already are. There will be no legal basis to deny a bisexual
the right to marry a partner of each sex, or a person to marry his pet.”
He also argued at the
time that legalizing gay marriage would: “De-emphasize the importance of
traditional marriage to society, weaken it, and place our entire democratic
system in jeopardy by eroding its foundation.”
My 2 Cents: As simple as possible – Speaker Johnson can hold any
view about sex and marriage and such any way he chooses based on his beliefs
and life experiences and such – but he has no right – none whatsoever as the
Speaker of the House to try and pass bills and cram his beliefs on the public
with his wild views as those stated above.
That’s my view on Speaker
Johnson and I honestly believe the vast majority of the public feels the same
way about their own sex life and not based on Johnson’s view of what it ought
to be according to his beliefs and potentially public policy based on his
extreme wild views stated above.
I wonder why all that listed
above did not come out before he was voted into the speakership?
Thanks for stopping by.
No comments:
Post a Comment