GOP Rep. Moore: With Mike Johnson, We’re Taking a Knee Deep in Our Own Territory

In an interview with Mobile, AL radio FM Talk 106.5, Rep. Barry Moore (R-AL), a member of the House Freedom Caucus, voiced his frustration over some of the decisions made by House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) in his dealings with congressional Democrats.

Moore, who voted against tabling his colleague House Speaker Marjorie Taylor Greene’s (R-GA) motion to vacate last week, maintains he would not have voted for Johnson to vacate the speakership despite voting to keep it alive on the House floor.

However, he indicated he was disappointed with Johnson, who said he was taking “a knee” deep in the GOP’s territory.

Partial transcript as follows:

It puts our guys in a tough spot. Some of these votes, whether it is FISA reauthorization, Israel funding tied to Ukraine for those of us who don’t want to send any more money to Ukraine, we want some oversight on the money that has already been sent, we want some audits, you know those kinds of things — it puts some of these guys in a tough spot because you either because you either vote for Israel’s funding or you vote [against] Ukraine’s funding. They should have been separate. Altogether, they should have been separate. Instead, the way we did it under the rule, they just move it up to the Senate. It’s more money for Ukraine. The can even divert some of the funds we’re going to send to Taiwan to Ukraine.”

I don’t know what it is with this love affair with Ukraine, but it puts our members in tough spots. And so I don’t know why Mike Johnson — we’ve given him a couple of landing spots. We could have very easily put the border security bill a couple of weeks ago in with the Ukraine and the Israel funding and help secure the border. But for some reason, and I think because he just rolled over to the wishes of the Democrats, is we had a separate vote on those and the rules. So now, in the Senate, they don’t even worry about the border. They can just send more money to Ukraine.

And that is just for those of us who are sitting out here as Republicans. That’s concerning. And one thing I said, Jeff, is when we were going through this McCarthy thing, I always said when we get the majority, we can’t take a knee deep in our own territory. With Mike Johnson, we’re taking a knee, and I don’t appreciate that because when Pelosi was the speaker by golly, the Dems didn’t take a knee. They moved us deep in their own territory. They started just crazy funding this wide-open border stuff. We need to be holding the line.”

“The fear, the problem with Mike is he’s afraid if we threaten to shut down the government, that the Republicans will be damaged in November. But in some ways, that was the leverage we had, and we just have not been willing to hold the line to say, I’ll shut it down, fix it, and start it back up before I’ll continue this process of driving it off the cliff. If the Democrats want to drive this country off the cliff, we should not be riding shotgun.

And I think the problem with Johnson is he’s just, he’s not in a position to fight, or not willing to fight, hold the line, and he’s getting bad advice from within his own circle.

Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor