Mike Johnson Sparks Fury With Donald Trump Border Comments

Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike Johnson has triggered a backlash after revealing he speaks to Donald Trump about congressional border negotiations.

Johnson, a Louisiana Republican who became speaker in October 2023, has been bogged down in negotiating a national security deal with President Joe Biden and has faced criticism from his Republican colleagues who are concerned about the levels of spending in the deal.

While Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries want to approve funding to war-torn Ukraine, Johnson has criticized the bipartisan Senate deal and said additional aid to Ukraine needs to include significant changes to border security.

GOP representatives have expressed increasing concerns about security at the southern border. There were more than 2.47 million encounters at the southern border in fiscal 2023, an increase from about 2.38 million a year earlier, according to data from CBP.

Johnson argued that the solution to the ongoing wave of migrant crossings is the GOP’s border and immigration H.R. 2 measure, which would restrict immigration and fund border security efforts, and passed the House without a single Democratic vote.

“What I told President Biden at the White House today is the same thing that I’ve been saying to him since I was handed the gavel to become speaker, and that is our border, our national border, is national security,” Johnson told reporters. “That has to be top of mind. That’s what the American people demand, that’s what they deserve and that’s what the House Republicans are united around.”

Speaking about his conversations with Trump, the GOP presidential frontrunner, Johnson told Fox News: “He and I have been talking about this pretty frequently.” Johnson said Trump told him to not compromise with Democrats and that he last spoke with Trump on Monday night.

Newsweek contacted representatives for Trump and Johnson by email to comment on this story.

But writing on X, formerly Twitter, Johnson was criticized for interacting with Trump.

Victor Shi, a Biden delegate, wrote: “There we have it. ‘Speaker’ Mike Johnson just admitted on Fox that he is consulting with Donald Trump over the border package. House Republicans are all owned by Donald Trump. They don’t actually care about securing the border. It’s all about politics. Full stop.”

Political commentator Lindy Li wrote: “Mike Johnson admitted on national TV he’s taking orders from Trump on the border & other policies. I repeat: The Speaker of the United States is taking orders from a terrorist rapist facing 91 criminal charges. We are now a govt OF the traitor, BY the traitor & FOR the traitor.”

Trump critic Ron Filipkowski said: “Trump doesn’t want his number one issue this election taken away and he gave Johnson his marching orders. They don’t want to fix the border, they want the issue.”

Another X user said: “Trump is actually the Speaker of the House.”

On Wednesday, Johnson met with Biden to discuss the funding request.

The White House issued a statement following the meeting saying: “The president called on Congress to quickly provide additional funding to support Ukraine and send a strong signal of U.S. resolve. The president also made clear that we must act now to address the challenges at the border.

“He expressed his commitment to reaching a bipartisan agreement on border policy and the need for additional resources at the border.”