By Kristin Wilson and Haley Talbot | CNN
Speaker Mike Johnson warned on Wednesday that an effort to oust him from his leadership post would not be helpful for the Republican majority and “would be chaos in the House.”
Johnson, who has faced pushback from conservatives over his handling of government funding, argued that it was important to keep the government open and cautioned against any push to strip him of the gavel.
“It doesn’t serve our interest, I didn’t think, to not fund the government and shut it down at this critical time,” he said at a news conference. The speaker went on to say, “That just wasn’t an option. I don’t think that would be helpful to us from a political standpoint for the Republican Party to continue to govern, to maintain, keep and then grow our majority in November. I thought that would have been a great hindrance to it. And so that wouldn’t be helpful, and nor does the motion to vacate help us in that regard either. It would be chaos in the House.”
GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has filed a motion to remove Johnson from the speakership, but has not yet moved to force a vote on it.
Johnson and Greene met on Wednesday after the House GOP leadership news conference.
After meeting with Johnson, Greene said she aired her grievances with him and told him not to move forward with any aid to Ukraine and to drop his FISA plans. Leadership has been seeking to adance a FISA reauthorization and reform bill in the chamber this week.
“He does not have my support and I’m watching what happens with FISA and Ukraine. Those are the two things that we’ll all be watching,” she told CNN’s Manu Raju.
She declined to say when she would move forward with a vote to push Johnson from the speakership. Greene said, “he discussed having a kitchen cabinet group that would be a group of advisers for him, asked me if I was interested and I said I’ll wait and see what his proposal is on that.”
Specifically, the…
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