House Speaker Johnson on Using Appropriations Process to Stem Border Crisis: ‘We Are Willing to Die on That Hill’

During an appearance on FBN’s “Evening Edit,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) expressed his willingness to shut down the federal government to force action from the Biden administration on the southern border.

Johnson said his caucus was “willing to die on that hill.”

“Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer says they are getting everything they want in non-Defense spending, that it doesn’t cut spending and Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene says it does nothing to stop the border crisis, stop the invasion, stop the weaponized government targeting Biden’s political enemies and innocent Americans,” host Elizabeth MacDonald said. “What do you make of those criticisms?”

“Well, listen, Chuck Schumer is going to spin it as best he can, but this is not what they wanted to do,” Johnson replied. “In fact, this amounts to a $30 billion cut to what the Senate had written, what they wanted to spend in the appropriations process. So this is significant. By the way, we clawed back unspent COVID funds, that $6.1 billion part of this, $10 billion more from that IRS fund that they had set aside. So that’s $20 billion out of that, in total. This is significant savings for the people. Again, not everything we wanted.”

“Now, Marjorie is not wrong,” he continued. “The border is on fire. You know, Liz, I took 64 members down on a trip down there last week and what we saw was heartbreaking and infuriating. We are willing to die on that hill. The appropriations process is to keep the government funded to make sure our troops are paid, that the federal government operates and in the middle of all that, we are having a serious fight about securing that border and we are insistent upon that. We have been since the day I got the gavel, and none of that has changed.”

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