Oct 26, 2023
MAGA Republican House Speaker's Past Comes Back To Haunt Him
The latest Republican elected House Speaker, Mike Johnson, gets exposed in the national spotlight for his history of devastating comments over Donald Trump in the 2020 election, the LGBTQ community and Roe v. Wade after humiliating Speaker of the House chaos. Rayyvana and Sharon Reed break it down on The Damage Report.
- 8 minutes
I want to tell all my colleagues here
what I told the Republicans in that room
last night.
I don't believe there are any
coincidences in a matter like this.
I believe that scripture, the Bible,
is very clear that that God is the one
that raises up those in authority.
[00:00:15]
He raised up each of you, all of us.
And I believe that God has ordained and
allowed each one of us to be brought here
for this specific moment in this time.
>> Speaker 2: He is a religious nut.
There he was ascending
to a very high role.
[00:00:32]
Third in line for the President,
talking about his religion,
thumping his Bible in our
supposedly secular government.
I mean, we invade countries for
being a theocracy.
We go into other countries and
topple their governments because
of them being based on religion.
[00:00:50]
But here we have again, third in line for
President of the United States,
talking about how he was
brought here by religion.
And we know that he loves to introduce
legislation on the basis of his religion.
[00:01:07]
So let's go to this reporting from CNN.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson has
a history of harsh anti-gay language from
his time as an attorney for
a socially conservative legal
group in the mid aughts.
Johnson called homosexuality
a inherently unnatural and
[00:01:24]
dangerous lifestyle that would
lead to legalized pedophilia and
possibly even destroy, quote,
the entire democratic system.
Ironic thing here is if homosexuality,
as he called it,
[00:01:39]
would actually destroy the entire
democratic system, he would support it.
He would be leading the pride parade,
waving the rainbow flag, because this is
a man who has done everything in his power
to destroy democracy in our country.
[00:01:55]
And I'm not making this up,
I'm not aggrandizing the situation.
It's just facts.
This is an election denier, from Axios.
In December 2020, Johnson led an amicus
brief signed by more than 100
House Republicans in support of
a failed Texas lawsuit that sought
[00:02:14]
to invalidate Biden's election
victory in four swing states.
Johnson also trafficked in a baseless
conspiracy theory in November 2020 about,
quote, rigged dominion voting machines
allegedly having ties to deceased
Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez.
[00:02:32]
And as you probably assumed,
based on his putting religion
at the front of his politics,
he is one of the worst in the House of
Representatives on the issue of abortion.
Take a look.
>> Speaker 1: Roe v Wade gave
constitutional cover to the elective
[00:02:50]
killing of unborn children in America.
Period.
You think about the implications
of that on the economy.
We're all struggling here to cover
the bases of Social Security and
Medicare and Medicaid and all the rest.
If we had all those able
bodied workers in the economy,
we wouldn't be going upside down and
toppling over like this.
[00:03:06]
Listen.
>> The gentleman.
>> I will not yield.
I will not.
Roe was a terrible corruption of
America's constitutional jurisprudence.
>> Speaker 2: There is something ironic
about him talking about Social Security
and Medicare there because he
supports ending those programs.
[00:03:24]
He has, in no uncertain terms, said that
he supports privatizing those programs.
And there he was using his supposed
support of those systems as justification
for why we need to get rid of legal
abortion in this country, which,
[00:03:41]
mind you, when abortion is restricted,
more abortions happen.
They're just happening in unsafe ways,
in unsafe conditions,
putting the lives of more
pregnant people at risk.
But they don't care about that.
They're not pro life.
[00:03:57]
They're pro forced birth.
And he's gonna have to work pretty hard
with this impending government shutdown,
as well as military aid for
Israel and Ukraine,
which I'll just say this Gaza won't see
another dollar with Johnson in charge,
I'm sure, and he's also very vehemently
opposed aid to Ukraine as well.
[00:04:16]
So it'll be interesting to see
how these things play out.
I've got a little bit more on
the Republican reaction and
celebration of this man.
But first, Sharon, I wanna bring you
in and get your thoughts on this person
who is he's not hiding the fact that his
religious values is how he's going to lead
[00:04:33]
what is supposed to be
our secular government.
>> Speaker 3: He calls it religion.
I call it occult.
Okay?
He's diabolical in his dysfunction.
He is far worse than speaker 55,
56 is far worse.
[00:04:51]
Radical.
Have you ever heard his podcast?
I tried to listen for a few minutes.
He and his wife have this podcast where
they go over everything that's in
the headlines.
Cultural wars, the war on women,
which he loves, they love.
And she co signs on that, and
it was very difficult to even stomach it.
[00:05:09]
I'm a journalist.
I'm trying to gather information here.
I couldn't even stomach it.
I think God is very angry,
if you believe God.
Wait, what's that?
God is very angry.
Okay, I just heard from God,
stop invoking the Lord's name,
[00:05:25]
in this destructive thing that
you're pushing against gay people,
women, children, everyone,
who do you love?
Who do you love?
That would be a great question to ask, but
the reporter would probably just get
shouted down like the other day.
>> Speaker 2: They were already
scared to have to answer for
[00:05:42]
his leading the charge to overturn
democracy in our country.
The entire party was yelling,
shut up, shut up.
To this reporter who asked.
>> Political genius.
>> And she asked a salient question,
a reasonable question, to ask this person,
who has, in no uncertain terms,
been very public about his support for
[00:06:01]
overturning democracy, for
overturning the election.
I mean, he was the very vocal leader
of that movement in the House,
despite his lack of
seniority within the party.
But when you ask him about it,
then you're going to be met with shut up.
[00:06:16]
Now is not the time to talk about policy,
which I thought was interesting.
Maybe I can get your thoughts on that.
And what we've seen throughout this
debacle with the speakership is it's not
an issue of policy right this is a party
that agrees on a lot of these issues.
[00:06:31]
They agree on not certifying
the election results.
They agree on severely restricting or
completely ending a woman's
right to choose, demonizing and
legislating away protections for
gay people.
[00:06:47]
So him saying now is not the time for
policy, I mean,
it hasn't been the time for policy.
This has been a naked power grab
by very Trump aligned members of
the Republican Party.
>> Speaker 3: Yeah,
they're not getting anything done.
Thank goodness.
[00:07:03]
Okay?
They've wreaked havoc.
They've created divide, hate.
I know we're going to cover
another mass shooting.
Listen there's,
they haven't even caught the guy yet, but
I believe it's all connected to
the society we live in today.
America, look at your life.
[00:07:20]
Anybody who thinks the Republican Party
is distancing itself from that thing and
that insurrection thing,
okay, they're not.
They're more on board than ever.
This thing where you heard
pundits saying over and
over again that I think there's a crack.
[00:07:35]
They've had enough.
No, the guy with the plastic hair.
What kind of gel is that?
Now, that does fascinate me.
He wanted to get rid of the other guy
because neither one of them could trust
the other, and
they just don't like each other.
And now he's running all over town and
doing interviews.
[00:07:53]
If that's your biggest cheerleader,
that's all we need to know.
The Republican Party is still gonna
be up to these shenanigans, and
they won't stop unless they're forced
to stop, or we all suffer to the end.
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