Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., is facing renewed motion to vacate threats a day after he introduced a plan to pass foreign aid.
Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., threatened to force a vote to oust the speaker during remarks in House Republicans’ closed-door conference meeting on Tuesday morning, if the speaker did not willingly step aside first.
“I asked him to resign…he said he would not,” Massie told reporters after the meeting. “And I said, well, you’re the one who’s going to put us into this because the motion is going to get called, OK? The motion will get called.”
Massie took it a step further and said Johnson would lose more GOP support than the eight House Republicans who voted to oust former Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., last year.
Speaker Mike Johnson is facing another motion to vacate threat
A defiant Johnson said at his weekly press conference afterward, “I am not resigning.”
“It is, in my view an absurd notion that someone would bring a vacate motion. We’re simply here trying to do our job. It is not helpful,” Johnson said. “It is not helping the House Republicans advance our agenda, which is in the best interest of the American people.”
Massie is among the conservatives pushing back against Johnson’s plan for aid to Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan, which was announced Monday night and is already facing pushback from members on the right over its lack of border security provisions.