Speaker Mike Johnson resorted to a barely passable stock answer when he was confronted with some embarrassing shutdown polling on MAGA-friendly network Newsmax.
Speaking on Finnerty on Monday, the Louisiana Republican was confronted with polling that stated Americans are now blaming President Trump and Congressional Republicans, rather than the Democrats, for the ongoing federal impasse.
Republicans and Donald Trump have tried to pin blame for the shutdown on the Democrats by inaccurately claiming they were prioritizing health care for undocumented immigrants, rather than a fight over retaining enhanced subsidies under the Affordable Care Act.
Faced with the USA Today polling by the host, Johnson spluttered, “Well, I’m not surprised by some of those polls, because the mainstream and legacy media is completely on the side of the Democrats.”
He said, without irony, “They’re repeating their false talking points…the facts are on our side.”
He added that “Republicans did the right thing” in passing a clean continuing resolution “just to keep the lights on.”
Surveys by The Washington Post, Kaiser Family Foundation, and the CBS News/YouGov poll that Rob Finnerty cited found that Americans aren’t buying it, though.
In the latter survey, 39 percent of respondents said they believe Trump and congressional Republicans deserve the most blame for the shutdown. Thirty percent of respondents blame Democrats more, and 31 percent attribute the blame equally.
They largely blame the shutdown on Trump and Republican lawmakers and are unhappy with their response to the crisis. A majority of Republican voters, including self-described MAGA loyalists, also want to see health care subsidies renewed.
Johnson, meanwhile, has shied away from debating the issue with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who dared the speaker to engage in a live public debate about it.
“When the poll says that about 13 percent of the people approve of your messaging, then you make desperate pleas for attention, and that’s what Hakeem Jeffries has done,” Johnson said, appearing to cite a Punchbowl News poll that found that the Democrats, too, are struggling to sell their vision of the provenance of the shutdown among Capitol Hill staffers.
