WASHINGTON (The Thursday Times) — US House Speaker Mike Johnson said on Saturday that he decided “pretty quickly after election night” not to seek the Republican leadership in the next Congress, telling Fox News that “leaders have to take responsibility when things go wrong”.
In his first television interview since the 3 November midterms, in which Democrats took both the House and the Senate, Johnson said Republicans had “left it all on the field” but could not defy history. “We don’t like the results,” he said. “Real leadership, I’ve always believed, you lead from the front, and leaders have to take responsibility when things go wrong, whether it’s individually deserved or not.”
He said that as speaker he had travelled enough miles to circle the globe 14 times, led almost 750 campaign events, and raised almost $900 million for House Republicans. “I’m going to remain in this fight, but from a role different than as minority leader in the next Congress,” he said.
‘The wrong choice’
His tone was different on Monday, when he told reporters on Capitol Hill that he was “sorry that the voters made the wrong choice” and predicted that the next two years under a Democratic House would be “a bit of a circus”.
House Republicans this week chose Jim Jordan of Ohio, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, to lead them in the new Congress, where they will be in the minority. Senate Republicans kept John Thune as their leader.
Democrats are on course for at least 55 Senate seats and 256 House seats when the new Congress meets in January, with a handful of House races still being counted and two Louisiana seats going to runoffs next month. They also won Alaska’s governorship, their first there since 1998.
Democrats have a leadership contest of their own. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland is challenging Chuck Schumer for the Senate Democratic leadership, with a closed-door vote set for 1 December, while Hakeem Jeffries, the House Democratic leader, is expected to become speaker.
