House Speaker Mike Johnson has gone to unfortunate lengths while defending Donald Trump, but the Louisiana Republican broke new ground yesterday. At a Capitol Hill press conference, the GOP’s top congressional leader argued — with a straight face — that those prosecuting the former president are “eroding the people’s faith in the system of justice itself.”
Evidently, Johnson is of the opinion that the way to restore public confidence in the justice system — a system the House speaker has taken repeated steps to condemn — is for prosecutors to look the other way in response to evidence of felonies, and let powerful politicians get away with criminal wrongdoing.
Soon after, Johnson appeared at the CNBC CEO Council Summit, where Eamon Javers asked the House speaker whether every American should accept the election results in the fall. Johnson, alas, hedged. “Well, I hope so,” he replied. “That’s the intention.”
After some additional back and forth, Johnson added, “Look, we’re the rule of law team. I mean, we believe in the rule of law.”
Q: Kevin McCarthy said that every American should accept the election results in the fall. Do you agree with that?
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) June 4, 2024
MIKE JOHNSON: Well, I hope so … look, we're the rule of law team. pic.twitter.com/AabgdiYOPu
This is, evidently, a new talking point for the Republican leader: Johnson appeared on Fox News this past weekend and used the same line, boasting, “We are the rule of law party.”
To be sure, it would be great if the House speaker were correct. He is not.
A rule of law party wouldn’t nominate a felon for the nation’s highest office.
A rule of law party wouldn’t try to undermine public confidence in the judicial system without cause.
A rule of law party wouldn’t try to defund law enforcement agencies based on nonsensical conspiracy theories.
A rule of law party wouldn’t endorse retaliatory, politically motivated prosecutions against innocent people.
A rule of law party wouldn’t reward accused criminals, elevating them to positions in which they could help steer the party’s future.
A rule of law party wouldn’t have a suspected criminal, indicted on election-related charges, oversee the party’s election-year legal efforts. A rule of law party wouldn’t rally behind a presidential nominee who’s running on a platform of pardoning violent criminals and putting them back onto the streets. A rule of law party wouldn’t nominate for president a felon who’s surrounded himself with other convicted criminals. A rule of law party wouldn’t scramble to condemn one of its own after he encouraged voters to respect the legal process. The contemporary Republican Party, however, has done all of this and more — recently. It’s the same Republican Party that was indifferent toward Trump-era White House corruption, saw some of its members sentenced to prison, expressed indifference when their party’s then-president tried to weaponize federal law enforcement, and participated in a radical, dangerous, and unprecedented plot to overturn the results of a free and fair American presidential election. Speaker Johnson can keep pretending that the GOP is “the rule of law party,” but that won’t make it true.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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