Steve King: Boehner a Goner if He Touches Amnesty

Rep. Steve King (R-IA) told NewsMax in a recent interview that House Speaker John Boehner may lose his position if he tries to pass any immigration bills out of the House of Representatives.

“Asked to assess House Speaker John Boehner’s performance and the possibility he could be replaced before the next election, King observes: ‘John Boehner has been stronger throughout this partial shutdown and the debt ceiling than most everybody thought he would be. He did serve to unify the conference better than I thought,'” NewsMax’s Jim Meyers and Kathleen Walter wrote on Monday.

But King said he would have a different answer to whether Boehner could survive if he touched immigration issues. “We’ll have to see how the future issues play out,” King said. “For example, if immigration comes before the House, it would be the most divisive thing that could be brought up by Republicans in the House. Then I would have a different answer to that question.”

Boehner has not publicly promised that he would not use a series of piecemeal House immigration bills as a political ploy to get to a conference committee with the Senate’s “Gang of Eight” immigration bill, from which the Senate bill or a comprehensive immigration reform plan like it would emerge. For months, conservatives–including many members of the House and even Senate Gang of Eight member Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL)–have sworn off conference committee. Boehner’s House Homeland Security Committee chairman Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX), who publicly opposes conference committee with the Senate bill, has also called on Boehner to publicly oppose conference.