Though the early narrative around new House speaker Mike Johnson is how he’s not exactly (yet) a household name, the second-term congressman from Louisiana insists he’s no mystery man – his worldview has been in print for awhile now.
Roughly 48 hours after the U.S. House finally chose the Louisiana Republican as speaker, he sat with Fox News’ Sean Hannity for his first long-form sit-down. The “Hannity” host noted how focused the media was on his hard-right track record, and Johnson didn’t disagree.
“The press on the left have come at you and come at you hard on past writings about LGBTQ issues” in particular, Hannity said. “You have been getting hammered on this… and I want to ask you about it. I want to know exactly where you stand.”
Johnson said some of those comments – “I don’t even remember some of them” – came in legal arguments for groups trying to preserve traditional marriage laws whom he was representing: “I was called to go in and defend those cases in the court,” he said.
That’s where Johnson said he made a distinction between the laws of the land and his own, personal way of seeing the world.
“I respect the rule of law,” he said, “but I also genuinely love all people regardless of their lifestyle choices… I am a Bible-believing Christian – someone asked me today… people are curious, ‘What does Mike Johnson think about any issue under the Sun?’ I said, ‘Well, go pick up a Bible off your shelf and read it, that’s my worldview – that’s what I believe.’”
“Your personal worldview,” Hannity clarified.
“My personal worldview,” Johnson confirmed. “But there’s the thing – everybody comes comes to the House of Representatives with deep personal convictions. But all of our personal convictions are not going to become law.”
Johnson also described his visit with Joe Biden as “cordial” – “It was a meet-and-greet” – though described the president’s term as “failing.” He also said he supported aid for Ukraine and Israel, but insisted legislators would find “pay-fors” in their budget so we’re not just “printing money” for proxy wars.
“We can’t be dropping money out of helicopters,” he said.
Watch the entire interview in the video above.
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