SPIN DOCTOR

Panicked Mike Johnson Struggles to Spin Trump’s Death Threats

Johnson tried to defend and dismiss the president’s language.

House Speaker Mike Johnson dialed up the outrage card as he tried to defend President Donald Trump’s call for the execution of Democratic lawmakers.

Johnson stepped in to defend the president’s rhetoric—not by endorsing it outright, but by shifting blame onto the Democrats.

Trump’s Truth Social post slammed into overdrive after six Democratic lawmakers, who are all veterans, released a direct message to U.S. service members, telling them that they can and must “refuse illegal orders.”

REVENGE TOUR

Trump Shares Violent Call to Hang His Political Foes

Sarah Ewall-Wice

Trump responded with a post reading, “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH,” and even reposted a Truth Social user who wrote, “HANG THEM GEORGE WASHINGTON WOULD!!”

Johnson attempted to defend the president’s language, dismiss it, and scold Democrats all in the same breath as reporters hunted him down on Capitol Hill to get his take on Trump’s wild posts.

He told reporters the uproar was misplaced. According to him, Trump was simply “defining the crime of sedition.”“That is a factual statement,” he said, insisting that lawyers would need to “parse” the statute. It was Democrats, he claimed, who were acting “wildly inappropriate.”

Johnson acknowledged he hadn’t seen the full string of Trump’s comments, an excuse the speaker frequently leans on. He nonetheless joined the president in going after the six Democrats who had addressed military personnel.

“For a senator like Mark Kelly or any member of the House or Senate to behave in that kind of talk is to me so just beyond the pale,” he said, abruptly ending with, “I’m not going to say anything more on it.”

Play Video

Some Republicans weren’t buying Trump’s wording. Senate Majority Leader John Thune said, “I don’t agree with that,” though he still dragged Democrats for being “ill-advised and provocative and unnecessary.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt clarified that Trump did not literally want lawmakers executed. “No,” she responded to a reporter who asked if the president actually wanted the lawmakers to be put to death. When asked by the Daily Beast for comment, the White House referred us to Leavitt’s comments.

Johnson took a second attempt at defending Trump later on Thursday, even conceding that his wording was remarkable. “The words that the president chose are not the ones that I would use,” he said. “Obviously, I don’t think that... these are crimes punishable by death or any of that.”

Still, he doubled down on the central grievance. “Members of Congress in the Senate [and] House should not be telling troops to disobey orders. It is dangerous.”

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer torched the entire episode in a floor speech, warning that Trump “is lighting a match in a country soaked with political gasoline.”

“Every senator, every representative, every American, regardless of party, should condemn this immediately and without qualification,” Schumer said. “Because if we don’t draw a line here, there is no line left to draw.”

Representatives for Johnson did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Daily Beast.

See more of our coverage in your search results.

ADD THE DAILY BEAST ON GOOGLE

Leigh KimminsReporter

Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast here.