Navalny was willing to take on Vladimir Putin and risk his life. Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson is so afraid of losing his speakership that he caves to Marjorie Taylor Greene

Upon the news of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s death, House Speaker Mike Johnson denounced Vladimir Putin.

“As Congress debates the best path forward to support Ukraine, the United States and our partners must be using every means available to cut off Putin’s ability to fund his unprovoked war in Ukraine and aggression against the Baltic states,” he said in a statement.

Of course, Johnson’s words would hold much more weight if he had actually put through the aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan that the Senate passed on the floor of the House of Representatives. Indeed, as the Senate labored late into the night on Monday and into the wee hours of Tuesday to pass that aid bill, Johnson summarily killed the bill because it did not address immigration at the US-Mexico border.

This came after Johnson and the rest of House Republican leadership blew up a bipartisan agreement that would have included aggressive restrictions to immigration in exchange for aid to Israel and Ukraine. Johnson, like most of the Republican Party, did so in the service of Donald Trump after he came out in opposition to the deal — despite the fact it would give him sweeping authority to deport migrants if he became president again.

  • bostonbananarama@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    I’m not the person you were talking to, but the last 30 years have been moronic off the cuff ideas that were poorly executed. It looked a lot like his presidency. Trans service member ban by tweet, banning Muslims from 7 countries on a whim, etc. No reason to think those weren’t his ideas, as they’re both stupid and bigoted, they fit nicely within his wheelhouse.

    But more importantly, you don’t get to claim that he has no hand is developing policies and then ask others to prove you wrong. You made the claim, you have the burden on supporting it or making clear that it’s merely speculation.

    • rdyoung@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      None of what you said is policy at all. And yes, I get to turn it around because I am not aware of any speech or even publication by him or his team that outlines what his presidency will work toward and what they stand for. This is also true for every single republican running over the past few decades.

      As for the shit he did pull. Yeah, maybe some of it was a knee jerk reaction but I’d still bet that he is getting notes passed from the likes of putin, Harlan Crow, etc. And none of that is his idea. Hell, most of the progressive ideas the right fights against were originally from their side of the aisle though they were from before some of them were born.