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Trump and Johnson

Speaker Donald Trump

Donald Trump has been president for just three days. And in that time, he’s only tightened his grip on House Republicans.

Let us introduce to you Speaker Donald Trump.

We don’t say this to denigrate Speaker Mike Johnson. Yet there’s no question that Johnson wouldn’t have survived the speaker vote in early January without Trump’s direct intervention. Since then, Johnson has only aligned himself more closely with Trump. No speaker in recent memory in either party has so thoroughly committed themselves to executing a president’s agenda or showed such unwavering loyalty. Trump proposes and Johnson approves, to offer a new twist on the old Washington adage.

Here are some examples:

– Trump is getting involved in the minor details of legislative strategy. Just last month, Trump directed Johnson to insert a debt limit provision into a bill to avert a government shutdown, only to see hardline GOP conservatives rebel. Now, Trump is again wading into detailed discussions about how Republican leaders should seek to raise the debt limit, structure an aid package to respond to California’s devastating wildfires and just how GOP lawmakers should fund federal agencies this coming year. Trump has a right to do so, of course, but in his previous term, Trump avoided much of the detailed work of governing. That may not be the case this time around.

– Trump is roughly halfway through his plan to meet face-to-face with every House Republican. He plans to finish this outreach during the next month.

– Next week’s House GOP retreat is at Trump National Doral Miami, the president’s club. Trump is scheduled to meet with House Republicans on Monday.

– Johnson has said as recently as Sunday that Trump shouldn’t pardon violent Jan. 6 offenders. When Trump did just that, Johnson said he wouldn’t “second guess” the president. “We’re looking forward,” Johnson said on Wednesday, clearly uninterested in discussing the reversal.

Later in the day, Johnson announced he was reappointing a select committee to “uncover the full truth” of what happened during the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. Which, of course, occurred four years ago.

– Trump is setting committee assignments. On the brink of Trump returning to office, Johnson fired Rep. Mike Turner (R-Ohio) as the chair of the House Intelligence Committee, citing pressure from “Mar-a-Lago.” Johnson said Trump didn’t direct him to fire Turner.

– Trump freely admitted that he knowingly whittled down Johnson’s slim House Republican majority in order to staff up the incoming administration. Standing next to Johnson on Inauguration Day, Trump declared, “We gave [Johnson] a majority of almost nothing and then I said to make it tougher on him, let me take two or three of the people, right? I said he’ll only have to suffer with that for about three months.”

– Johnson spends much of his free time with Trump, including nights and weekends. Johnson was with Trump on Nov. 6 as he declared victory in his bid to return to the White House. Johnson spent New Year’s Day with Trump. Johnson and Trump held a joint press conference last year at Mar-a-Lago where the speaker announced the House would take up election integrity legislation Trump wanted. Johnson was even on his way to Mar-a-Lago when Secret Service agents thwarted a second assassination attempt against Trump in mid-September.

Of course, Trump has had an iron grip on the GOP for years now. He’s used to that fealty from Republican lawmakers. Yet after serving as president for four years — and observing Congress from a distance for the last four — Trump seems to feel much more comfortable exerting direct influence over members of the House. We’ll see how much he tries to do this with Republican senators as well.

With the rise of the modern speakership — say Tip O’Neill — speakers became national figures in their own right. Not peers with a president; no one is in the American system. But not subservient either.

During Trump’s first term, former Speaker Nancy Pelosi became in many ways the Democratic party leader by challenging Trump, at least until Joe Biden emerged as the party’s presidential nominee.

Along with facing down challenges from conservative hardliners, Johnson must now deal with a president looking to vastly expand executive-branch power at the expense of Congress. For instance, Trump and his top aides want to “impound” funds that Congress has already approved, as well as other dramatic steps. How far can Johnson go in defending his institution against a wildly ambitious president and still keep his own job?

The other major issue for Johnson is that if rank-and-file Republicans see Trump as the ultimate arbiter of what happens in the House, why wouldn’t they go to the president directly instead of the speaker? Go cut a deal with the guy who sees himself as the ultimate dealmaker. And if Trump likes it, Johnson will go along with it.

Attention Johnson and Thune. Trump said on “Hannity” Wednesday night that he’d like FEMA to stop helping states rebuild after disasters.

Here’s Trump:

The top two House Republican leaders are from Louisiana, a frequent beneficiary of FEMA after hurricanes.

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Editorial photos provided by Getty Images. Political ads courtesy of AdImpact.