Speaker Johnson Delivers Remarks at House GOP Press Conference

[0:00] Thank you. I'm glad French Hill is here. Chairman Hill did an extraordinary job in the housing [0:05] bill. We'll talk about that in a moment. But I've got to address a very sobering reality that is [0:09] facing the country this morning. I did it with the House Republicans, and I was pretty animated [0:13] this morning. I was up late last night, as I'm sure many of you were, and you saw the result of [0:18] this latest, these primary elections for the Democrat Party. The headlines this morning say [0:22] it all. I've got a collection of them here. Socialist earthquake, one of them said. Mamdani [0:27] Hale's new chapter for Democrats, one of the chyron said this morning on the news. Hakeem [0:31] Jeffries, my counterpart, you know, the Democrat leader here in the House, was booed at some of [0:37] these return parties last night. You saw that on social media and some of the clips when he was [0:43] being interviewed on the screen, the crowds in New York in his own backyard in the Bronx in one of [0:49] these districts were booing him, and they shouted, you're next. I'm not sure if you're [0:55] you're next. Hakeem Jeffries has a tall task ahead of him right now. He's got to go out and somehow [1:02] make a credible pitch to Democrat establishment donors that that's a good national investment [1:06] right now. That's a tough one to make. He has just proven that he cannot even hold the line in [1:10] his own backyard. How can he possibly defend against the Marxist march around the country in [1:16] these other districts? This is not your father's Democrat Party as we see all the time. Last night [1:21] among the incumbents who lost Adriano Espio, who's chair of the Democrats Hispanic Caucus, Dan Goldman, [1:27] who was mocked for his Jewish heritage in a coffee shop in New York and maligned online because of [1:33] that. The Democrat Party, the Socialists, the Marxists have nominated some of the most radical candidates [1:39] to ever run for office and they're running for Congress. The insurgent left is on the rise. I was [1:45] reminded all last night and this morning about the the warning, the admonition from the Gipper [1:51] President Ronald Reagan, and he reminded us constantly freedom is never more than one generation away [1:57] from extinction. And he said it's got to be fought for. It's got to be protected. It's got to be passed [2:01] along the next generation so that they too will know the same liberty, opportunity and security that we've known [2:06] and frankly too often take it for granted. He said freedom is not passed along in the bloodstream. [2:11] It's got to be fought for. And these are the times that Reagan was warning about. He was he was [2:16] warning about communism overseas. Now it is on our own shores and it is a very serious time and every [2:21] American needs to wake up and understand a threat. I want to share with you some of the lowlights, [2:25] some of these candidates who are emerging through these through the processes. Last night made crystal clear [2:31] as as leader Scalise said that Zoran Mondami and AOC and Bernie Sanders have just taken full control of the [2:36] Democrat Party of what was left of it. Across the country Democrats have candidates winning primaries [2:42] and rising through the ranks. There's a few of them. Vang in California, one of the Democrats, [2:47] she won't say the Pledge of Allegiance. Hamaway in New Jersey, Democrat candidate, socialist candidate, [2:53] has ties to Al Qaeda and other terrorists. Chevalier won last night in New York over Hakeem's counter endorsement. [3:01] She says she wants to abolish the border. She doesn't want a border for the country. [3:06] Mendoza in Arizona wants to decriminalize trans prostitution. Apparently that's the thing. [3:12] James in Iowa wants to apologize for being white. Gary Ott in Iowa performed a Satanist wedding. [3:20] And Bennett in New Jersey stopped going to church because Trump voters were there. [3:26] This is just a sampling. And these kind of people have been popping up. You've been hearing me say for weeks, [3:30] there are many Mamdani's popping up all around the country. It is a dangerous thing. This is not a joke. [3:35] We are in a fight right now to save the Republic. And every American needs to take this seriously. [3:40] You need to wake up. This upcoming midterm election is not the midterm elections of years ago. [3:45] It's going to decide the direction of the country. Are we going to maintain our status as a constitutional republic [3:50] on our 250th anniversary? Are we going to make a new choice and go down some road towards a communist utopia? [3:56] That's the choice right now. We've been saying for months it's a contrast election. [4:00] We've been saying it's a contrast between common sense and crazy. That's exactly what's going on. [4:05] They give us new illustrations every day. And these radical candidates are self-describing. [4:10] They're self-identifying as Marxist. They want to fundamentally transform this country. [4:16] And sadly, many of these Democrat candidates and their voters just don't have the same zeal and affection for America. [4:22] They don't appreciate the freedom that we have in this country. [4:25] They're not even going to celebrate on July 4th. [4:28] There's a new Gallup NBC poll that came out. Did you see that? [4:31] Only 29% of Democrat voters that they polled said they're proud to be an American. [4:35] What happened to the Democrat Party? They compared the poll from just 20 years ago, where it was 90%. [4:42] Because that's where Republicans are, above 90%. 29%, over half of Democrats now say they would rather live in another country. [4:49] What a split screen we're seeing. [4:52] Right now we're triumphantly hosting the World Cup games all around the country. [4:56] And we're seeing people from different countries come and get a little taste of America, a little taste of freedom of our culture and our society. [5:03] And they appreciate it so much more than these socialists running for Congress. [5:07] Fans across the country are truly enjoying our world-class facilities and the incredible atmosphere. [5:13] On the field and off the field. [5:16] Thanks to social media we're seeing a lot of these. [5:18] This has been encouraging to see. [5:19] The visitors appreciate what we have. [5:21] Dutch travelers are in all Buc-ee's. [5:24] German players took a midnight trip to the Waffle House. [5:27] The greatest thing they've ever seen. [5:29] English fans are roaming the Everglades. [5:31] Japanese tourists marveling over free chips and salsa at a Mexican restaurant in Texas. [5:36] Don't forget your blessings. [5:39] People from Europe and Latin America, many countries around the world, many of whom, here's the key, they grew up under repressive state-controlled economies. [5:47] They've never known freedom. [5:48] They've never known these kinds of things. [5:50] And they're seeing them for themselves, the genius of America's system. [5:53] A system that rewards risk-takers and entrepreneurs and job creators and innovators and people who create jobs for others and expand the economy and opportunity and broaden the pathway out of poverty for more people. [6:05] That's what the Republicans stand for. [6:07] That's what French Hill fought for in the housing bill, to give more people a chance, to restore the American dream. [6:12] That's what we promised to the voters, and that's what we are delivering. [6:15] The irony is, and it is a sad irony, and I'm so disturbed this morning. [6:19] Y'all know me. [6:20] I'm a happy warrior. [6:21] I like to be optimistic and happy. [6:22] This is a very disturbing trend. [6:25] Visitors around the world marvel at what our system of free enterprise has built while rising socialist, Marxist, Democrat candidates are trying to tear the system down. [6:35] That's what they told you in their campaign speeches. [6:38] That's what they want to do. [6:39] They want to tear it down. [6:40] House Republicans are standing in the gap. [6:41] We are not going to let that happen. [6:43] And we had all the Republicans gathered up this morning, and I gave them the best locker room speech I can muster because now is the time. [6:50] We know America's not perfect. [6:51] It has never been. [6:52] But we've been in a gradual process of making a more perfect union for almost 250 years now. [6:57] We're going to continue that. [7:00] America's created more prosperity. [7:02] It's lifted more people out of poverty. [7:03] It's expanded more opportunity and innovation than any other country in the world. [7:07] It's not even close. [7:08] This is the greatest nation in the history of the world. [7:10] It's not even close. [7:11] Look at any objective factor. [7:12] You hear me say it all the time. [7:13] We're the most free, most successful, most benevolent, most prosperous nation that's ever been. [7:19] And it's not by happenstance. [7:21] It's because we're built on very firm foundational principles that the Marxist and the Socialist have disdain for. [7:26] What are the principles of America? [7:28] I mean, it's not a rhetorical question. [7:30] You all should be able to answer it. [7:32] Things like individual freedom, limited government, the rule of law, peace through strength, fiscal responsibility, free markets, human dignity, the sanctity of all life. [7:39] Why? [7:40] Because it's articulated in the nation's birth certificate in the Declaration. [7:43] It says right there in the second paragraph, we hold these truths to be self-evident. [7:47] What is the self-evident truth? [7:48] It's something you have to know. [7:49] It's obvious. [7:50] We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal. [7:53] Created equal. [7:54] It does not say just born equal. [7:55] It says created equal. [7:56] By someone. [7:58] And it's our Creator, God, who gave us our inalienable rights. [8:01] Among those rights of life, liberty, pursuit of happiness. [8:04] Such a profound statement. [8:05] When they did that 250 years ago, they were saying something. [8:09] The bold proclamation of a self-evident truth. [8:11] And the implication is that every single person is made in the image of that Creator. [8:16] Because the guys that wrote that, the men that wrote that, the founders that wrote it, were students of Scripture. [8:20] And they understood because everybody is made in the image of God, it means every single person has inestimable dignity and value. [8:25] And your value is not related in any way to the color of your skin or what zip code you live in or what your talents are. [8:30] It's all irrelevant. [8:31] Your value is inherent because it's given to you by God. [8:34] The Marxists and the socialists do not believe what I just told you. [8:37] They don't believe it. [8:38] Marxism, Karl Marx, his philosophy begins with a premise that there is no God. [8:41] The state is the God. [8:43] The state is the one that gives you your rights. [8:45] And guess what? [8:46] When the state gives you all your rights, the state can take the rights away. [8:49] Nobody's telling all these little young self-described socialists, oh, we'll give you free stuff. [8:54] But you're going to have to give up your freedom to go along. [8:57] They don't tell them that. [8:58] This thing's going to crash and burn. [8:59] It always has throughout history. [9:01] And the lesson of the 20th century alone is that tens of millions of innocent people have died because of these crazy quixotic notions. [9:08] We have to stand for freedom. [9:10] We've got to stand for America. [9:11] We've got to stand on the 250th birthday with greater conviction, clarity, and consistency than we ever have. [9:16] I'm glad that millions of visitors here for the World Cup see that. [9:20] I'm glad they got a little timely reminder. [9:22] They're giving us one. [9:23] All our faults and disagreements aside, America's filled with the most decent and faithful people. [9:29] This grand experiment in self-governance has worked because we have adhered to the foundations, and we have to defend them. [9:34] And that's what the Republicans are doing right now. [9:36] We're defending the foundations of the greatest country in the history of the world, not against your father's Democrat Party, but now against the Marxists. [9:45] And we're ready for the fight. [9:46] I'm telling you the House of Republicans are fired up for this. [9:48] We're going to win this midterm election. [9:50] We're going to maintain the beacon of hope and freedom and opportunity that this country has always been. [9:55] Indeed, as our first Republican President Lincoln said and as Reagan repeated, America is the last best hope of man on the earth. [10:03] I'm off the fight. [10:04] These guys are up for the fight. [10:06] This chairman's up for the fight. [10:07] All our colleagues are. [10:09] I'll take a few questions. [10:10] Yeah. [10:11] In the process of this press conference, President Trump announced that he is claiming for the housing bill that you all were just talking about. [10:20] He said he's canceling it until the SAVE Act is passed, and he called this housing bill which passed with such bipartisan support of minor importance and said it pales in comparison to the SAVE Act. [10:32] What is your reaction? [10:33] Yeah, my reaction is the truth of the matter. [10:36] I spoke to the president for 20 minutes before I went in and gave that rousing speech to the House of Republicans this morning. [10:41] He and I have talked about this a lot. [10:43] He has expressed the priority and the preference of the SAVE America Act. [10:47] We share that. [10:48] We passed it three times in the House. [10:50] The latest version was passed a few months ago, and it has proof of citizenship to register to vote and the proof of showing a photo ID when you show up to vote. [10:59] Basic issues that 90% of Americans agree, 70% of Democrats think you ought to have a photo ID to vote, and citizenship to vote in an American election is already in the law. [11:10] But we have to enforce it because you've got a few blue states that don't do that. [11:12] The president believes in election integrity. [11:15] He talks about it all the time, and we do as well. [11:17] And act indeed. [11:18] We have stood for that. [11:19] We've passed the SAVE America Act again. [11:20] Let me finish this. [11:21] This is very important. [11:22] That is the top priority because if you do not have safe elections in this grand experiment in self-governance that we have in a constitutional republic, you don't have anything. [11:31] And we've got to ensure it, and we have to press for election integrity measures. [11:34] That's why we've made it a top priority. [11:36] It has been stuck in the Senate, and here's why. [11:38] Because no Democrat in the House or Senate will vote for the SAVE America Act. [11:42] Those two things I just told you, they vote against that every single time, and they will. [11:47] Why? [11:48] That's a rhetorical question. [11:49] You should go ask them the actual question. [11:51] Why? [11:52] Against proof of citizenship and a photo ID? [11:54] Why is that? [11:55] They can't give you a cogent answer. [11:57] The reason is they do want to allow for cheating and fraud in the elections because it is the only way that the Marxists can win. [12:03] They cannot win on their ideas. [12:04] That's why this is so important. [12:06] The president is to us. [12:07] So how does that tie into housing? [12:09] He's laser focused on the SAVE America Act, as most common sense Americans are. [12:13] The only path, I think, to get that done, because you're never going to get seven Democrats to join 53 Republicans in the Senate to do that. [12:19] They will not do it. [12:20] But Chuck Schumer will never vote for that or release any Democrat to do it. [12:24] You have to put it on a reconciliation bill. [12:27] We believe that if you create a grant program that ties it to reconciling the budget and you allow blue states, if they come to their senses and they want to avail themselves of election integrity proposals and ideas and policies, they can draw down from a federal fund and use those funds. [12:43] We're willing to invest heavily in that. [12:46] And House Republicans will put together a reconciliation bill, reconciliation 3.0, that will have that. [12:50] I talked the president through that in detail this morning, as I have in the past. [12:54] And he said, can we do it? [12:55] I said, we can. [12:56] If the Republicans will stand together, we're on the line right now to defend it. [13:00] Hold on. [13:02] So that's what we're going to do. [13:03] The president said, I want to see some progress on it. [13:05] I said, I'd love to show it to you. [13:06] We've got a meeting today. [13:07] We have some more coming up. [13:08] And so he decided, and I didn't announce it. [13:11] I wanted him to announce it. [13:12] But we're delaying this. [13:13] As you know, he has a window of time before he has to sign a bill, and he's going to use a little bit more of that window of time. [13:18] And we're going to go through this together. [13:20] Now, the housing bill is a great product because this guy right here fought like a warrior poet to defend our principles. [13:26] It did have a lot of Elizabeth Warren's preferences and policy provisions in the original Senate bill. [13:32] But that's why we spend months and months and months doing the tug of war. [13:35] And we wound up having 85%. [13:39] That's my estimate, maybe more of the housing of the final product is housing conservative priorities and policies. [13:46] And the other things that are in there are not consequential, not as consequential as all the great things that that Chairman Hill outlined. [13:53] I mean, we're addressing the transformational legislation because we're addressing the affordability problem in housing that, as he said, has persisted since COVID. [14:01] When interest rates are high and cost are high, it makes the barrier to entry so high that young families can't get into houses anymore. [14:07] That's not a Republican or Democrat problem. [14:10] It's an American problem. [14:11] So Americans are fixing it. [14:13] And so we're going to reduce regulation so builders can build. [14:15] We're going to limit institutional investing in the housing market. [14:18] We're going to bring the American dream back within the grasp of hardworking American families. [14:24] It's critical to do. [14:25] Great policy. [14:26] The President, when we go through the details of the bill, he's going to understand that it's a good product. [14:30] And certainly something that fulfills his promises to bring down the cost. [14:34] Interest rates is another big priority of his and all of ours. [14:37] And I think the new Fed chair will do that. [14:38] We get the economy humming again. [14:40] We keep the straighter home moves open. [14:41] We keep gas prices down to earth. [14:43] This economy is going to take off like a rocket, y'all, because in 2025, as Scott Besson said, the Treasury Secretary said months ago, 2025 was like setting the table. [14:51] The feast and the banquet in the economy is in 2026. [14:54] We were doing that in the first quarter. [14:55] We had the Iran skirmish. [14:57] We settled that thing out. [14:58] We're cooking with gas. [14:59] We love to do it. [15:00] Yeah. [15:01] So is it your understanding that President Trump is going to sign the housing bill at a later date? [15:05] And how much later can it go? [15:07] Because as you said, affordability is huge for Americans. [15:10] This is a key bill to do it with. [15:13] If it doesn't get time. [15:14] You're talking about it. [15:15] You're talking about days. [15:16] You know, the window of time before. [15:17] It just passed last night. [15:18] Right. [15:19] So 10 days is my estimation. [15:21] He'll do within that 10 day window. [15:23] So, yeah. [15:24] Speaking of the World Cup and rights, the Supreme Court is going to rule perhaps as soon as this week on President Trump's challenge to birthright citizenship. [15:33] But then some of those Republicans, as you just did, and the White House are celebrating the U.S. men's national team whose top scorer is a birthright citizen. [15:41] How should Americans square what looks like a celebration of immigration with efforts to criminalize birthright citizenship? [15:48] Yeah. [15:49] So like all good things, they can be abused. [15:51] And birthright citizenship goes back to the root of the country, the history of the tradition. [15:56] When you look at the original intent of the Constitution and the founders and what they were doing, of course, they were facing a very different set of circumstances than we're facing now. [16:03] We know that it's been abused in recent years because people have literally just come over the border just to have a baby so that they can, you know, avail themselves of the social welfare system of America. [16:12] As I mentioned earlier, we're the most benevolent nation in the history of the world. [16:15] But this must be done within reason. [16:17] And so that's why the arguments were presented to the Supreme Court. [16:20] Is it time to reevaluate that? [16:21] We'll see where the court comes down on it. [16:23] I think they're going to look at that as originalist as they are as textualist. [16:26] I think they're also going to consider the factors that are at issue and the strength and stability of the country. [16:31] The President makes some very compelling arguments. [16:33] A lot of people do, and we'll see how that shakes out. [16:36] So I don't think it's inconsistent at all. [16:38] I think we can celebrate immigration, legal immigration. [16:41] We are a nation of immigrants, as we all recognize. [16:44] My grandfather came over on a boat from Sicily with eight siblings and started a fruit stand, you know, and I'm the Speaker of the House. [16:50] Only in America, okay? [16:52] But we embrace that. [16:54] We know that that's part of our history, but we also expect that people will come. [16:57] They will follow the spirit and the letter of the law. [16:59] They will assimilate to our country and not try to transplant Sharia law and all these other, you know, things and change who we are. [17:06] I think that's a very important thing for American identity, and I look forward to the court's opinion. [17:10] Yes, ma'am. [17:18] Stay tuned. [17:19] We're working through that, okay? [17:20] Doing a reconciliation bill is a very complicated process of consensus building. [17:23] We have a collection of ideas that I think every Republican certainly agrees with in principle, and they want to make sure, we all want to make sure that no Democrat can go out and say we cut any service. [17:32] They absolutely lied to you breathlessly for months about the first reconciliation bill, what it did. [17:38] Strengthening Medicaid, putting in program integrity measures and making sure that it's there for the people that actually are eligible for it and use it and getting fraudsters out of the system and young able-bodied men who are gaming the system and riding the wagon and illegal immigrants off the system is what we did. [17:53] Democrats lied about it, said that we took Medicaid away from it. [17:56] It's just simply not true. [17:57] We strengthened it for the people that need it, deserve it, and are legally allowed for it. [18:01] We got to make sure that what we put in this bill is ironclad, iron proof, and can get every vote, and I'm very optimistic about it. [18:08] There's some big priorities for the country and America, and sadly, no Democrat will give a vote for any of that because they just showed you what they're about last night in those elections, and there's more of that to come, I fear. [18:19] It is a very sad, dark harbinger for the future of America, but I will say this, and let me leave you with this thought. [18:24] This election, this midterm, I said it's unlike any other in the past. [18:28] There's no playbook for this. [18:29] We're in uncharted waters. [18:30] This election is a bridge election, and let me tell you why we're hopeful, because when the Republicans win in November and we hold this majority, no matter how big the majority is, we can deal with small majorities. [18:39] We've been doing that, all right? [18:40] I think it'll be larger, but when we hold the majority, no matter what the number is, then we get to 2028. [18:46] Let me tell you what's coming next, the presidential cycle. [18:48] How many of you know the Democrats have a much more shallow bench than Republicans do for the presidential cycle? [18:53] We're going to have a great year in 2028, and we're going to hold the White House and Senate in the House again. [18:57] Then we're going to get to 2030, and you know what's going to happen in 2030? [19:00] The census will happen, and it will reflect the mass exodus of population out of the blue states like New York, New Jersey, California, [19:07] these socialist utopias that they're trying and everybody's fleeing from. [19:11] You know where they're moving, Texas, Florida, Tennessee, the Carolinas, the red states. [19:14] So when the census reflects the population shift, there's a reapportionment of congressional seats. [19:20] And guess what's going to happen in 2030? [19:22] The red states are going to get a bunch more House seats. [19:24] We're going to be back in a time where we can build a larger majority. [19:27] We can hold the republic. [19:28] We can keep it for 100, 200, 300 more years, showed the Lord Terry, and we will send the Marxists packing. [19:34] That's not who we are in America, and we're looking forward to November. [19:37] Thank you.