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Mike Johnson Once Agreed to Speak at ‘Kill the Gays’ Pastor’s Conference – Until an NCRM Report
He’s now the most powerful elected Republican in the nation, second in line to the presidency, and the third most-powerful elected official in the country, but just five years ago Mike Johnson was a freshman U.S. Congressman from Louisiana who had made a name for himself as an attorney fighting for far-right Christian causes.
In 2018, U.S. Rep. Johnson was scheduled to deliver the keynote speech at a Bible conference hosted by infamous “Kill the Gays” Pastor Kevin Swanson, as this social media post from Brian Tashman, formerly of Right Wing Watch/People for the American Way showed in April of that year:
Remember Kevin Swanson, the pastor who wants the government to execute gay people?
He’s organizing a conference in DC and a Republican congressman is giving the keynote address. pic.twitter.com/H2or2kfvBn
— Brian Tashman (@briantashman) April 30, 2018
Swanson, who supported Uganda’s “Anti-Homosexuality Bill” that called for LGBTQ people to be executed or face life in prison, made headlines in 2015 for saying gay people should be put to death.
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As Right Wing Watch has reported, Swanson has called HIV/AIDS, “God’s retribution.” He has “defended Uganda’s kill-the-gays bill, warned that the Girl Scouts, women’s soccer and movies like ‘Frozen’ turn girls into lesbians, and accused gay people of causing devastating floods and hurricanes.”
Swanson also “frequently claimed that the government should put gay people to death,” Right Wing Watch had also reported, “and blamed natural disasters on gay people and women who wear pants.” He urged “people to hold up signs telling gay couples to die on their wedding day, and agreed “that gay marriage is like the Sandy Hook school massacre.”
Johnson had been slated to deliver a speech titled, “The Bible: Equipping the Man of God for Politics and the Culture War,” at Swanson’s Bible Family Conference. He also has ties to at least two groups designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as anti-LGBTQ hate groups: the Alliance Defending Freedom and the Family Research Council.
“Throughout my career,” Johnson wrote in a 2018 Facebook photo, standing with anti-gay hate group leader Tony Perkins, “I have worked tirelessly to support legislation that protects conservative values of faith, family and freedom.”
“This week, I was honored by the Family Research Council with the True Blue Award for my vote on critical bills that protect life and promote fiscal responsibility.”
NCRM published a report on May 1, 2018, on Congressman Johnson being scheduled to deliver the keynote address, and before publication reached out to the Congressman’s office but did not receive a response – until after our article ran.
Here’s the update we published the following day, May 2, 2018:
Rep. Johnson’s office responded to our inquiry. They first claimed:
“Congressman Johnson was invited to speak to a Christian conference in August. He was unaware of Mr. Swanson’s participation and of his previous comments. Once this was brought to the congressman’s attention, he immediately denounced those comments and withdrew his participation.”
When NCRM replied, noting there was no record of Rep. Johnson denouncing Swanson’s remarks, Johnson’s office responded: “The Congressman was asked by a friend not associated with Swanson or his organization to join a Bible conference in D.C. Once he learned of Swanson’s connection to the conference he immediately withdrew his participation.”
After NCRM’s article ran, Johnson’s name was removed from the schedule at Swanson’s Bible Family Conference.
It does not appear Speaker Johnson has ever denounced extremist anti-LGBTQ hate.
In a separate May 2 article, NCRM reported, “Rep. Johnson still appears to support the anti-LGBT movement. Last week he posted praise for his ‘good friend, law school classmate and former colleague, Kyle Duncan, on his confirmation today to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.'”
READ MORE: New GOP Speaker: Separation of Church and State Is Only a ‘Shield for People of Faith’
LGBT civil rights group Lambda Legal calls Duncan, “a lawyer who has built his career around pursuing extreme positions that target members of the LGBTQ community.”
This week, on Thursday, speaking to Fox News, Johnson said: “Someone asked me today in the media, they said, ‘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.”
Watch Johnson’s remarks below or at this link.
Speaker Mike Johnson tonight: “Someone asked me today in the media, ‘People are curious, what does Mike Johnson think about any issue?’ I said, ‘Well, go pick up a Bible off your shelf and read it. That’s my worldview.” pic.twitter.com/ylMWX1XVJy
— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) October 27, 2023
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Less than two weeks after Republicans and Democrats joined together to expel George Santos, the now-former GOP U.S. congressman is trying to arrange a plea deal to keep him out of prison.
“Santos is talking to federal prosecutors on Long Island about a plea deal, according to a newly filed court document,” ABC News reports, citing a court filing that reads: “The parties are presently engaged in plea negotiations with the goal of resolving this matter without the need for a trial.”
The former New York Republican freshman lawmaker is facing 23 charges ranging from money laundering to identity theft to theft of public funds, and lying to Congress, not to mention a damning Ethics Committee report.
READ MORE: Republicans Are Secretly Meeting With Allies of ‘Putin’s Buddy’ Orbán to End Ukraine Aid: Report
Santos has a September 2024 trial date set but federal prosecutors are trying to move that to May, according to the court filing.
On Sunday Santos hinted at a plea deal.
“Look, in the essence of everything going on, a plea is not off the table, obviously, at this point,” Santos told CBS New York’s Marcia Kramer in an interview.
Asked if he is afraid of going to jail Santos said, “I think everyone should be afraid of going to jail.”
Watch the interview below or at this link.
News
Republicans Are Secretly Meeting With Allies of ‘Putin’s Buddy’ Orbán to End Ukraine Aid: Report
Congressional Republicans are meeting in secret this week behind closed doors with allies of the far-right Christian nationalist authoritarian Prime Minister of Hungary, Viktor Orbán. Those allies, including from a Hungarian government agency that reportedly organized a far-right U.S. group’s conference in Budapest, are working to support Russian President Vladimir Putin’s illegal war against Ukraine. GOP lawmakers, especially in the House but increasingly in the Senate, have been voicing strong opposition to the U.S. sending any additional funding to Ukraine.
“Members of the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs and staff from the Hungarian embassy in Washington will on Monday begin a two-day event hosted by the conservative Heritage Foundation thinktank,” The Guardian reports. The Heritage Foundation, once considered the premier conservative think tank, by 2016 was a pro-Trump group. Now, Heritage is behind the massive Project 2025, which aims to install tens of thousands of pro-Trump loyalists into the federal government if the ex-president re-takes the White House.
“The first day,” The Guardian explains, “includes panel speeches about the Ukraine war as well as topics such as Transatlantic Culture Wars. It is expected to feature guests including Magor Ernyei, the international director of the Centre for Fundamental Rights, the institute that organized CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) Hungary.”
Orbán, called “Putin’s Buddy” just last week by Politico, is “a strongman who cultivates close ties with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin and who is widely seen as having undermined democracy and rule of law at home.”
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“In other words,” wrote U.S. Senate Judiciary Chair Dick Durbin (D-IL), “Far-right Republicans are conspiring with Hungary’s extremist Russian-sympathic PM Viktor Orbán to help former KGB dictator Putin defeat democratic Ukraine. Ronald Reagan and John McCain must be looking on in utter disbelief.”
Many are outraged that Republicans will be meeting with Orbán’s allies in D.C. while refusing to publicly acknowledge their attendance at the anti-Ukraine events. To date the guest list has not been published.
National security expert, former U.S. Rep. Denver Riggleman (R-VA), blasted the GOP’s secrecy: “A list of every representative in that meeting with Orban should be made available to the press. Public servants shouldn’t hide in the shadows— especially when discussing decisions with foreign leaders that could benefit Vladimir Putin.”
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Conservative commentator Bill Kristol explained, “Heritage Foundation and Viktor Orbán are not simply against aid for Ukraine. They are against Ukraine. They hate Ukraine, because a) they’re pro-Putin, and b) they hate liberal democracy, especially one fighting to defend itself against a brutal dictator.”
National security and international law expert Eugene Vindman, a retired U.S. Army colonel whose twin brother made national headlines when he blew the whistle on Donald Trump and was mercilessly targeted for his actions, blasted both the Hungarian prime minister and the GOP: “Viktor Orbán is actively interfering in domestic politics and colluding with extremist republicans to help Vladimir Putin. This is dangerous. Republicans must stop putting Putin ahead of U.S. national security interests.”
Legal experts are applauding Special Counsel Jack Smith’s move to “leapfrog” a Trump effort to delay his D.C. case by claiming he has immunity from prosecution and appealing the decisions by asking the U.S. Supreme Court to rule on that major question.
Trump is claiming he cannot be prosecuted for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election because he was president at the time, and is also claiming he cannot be prosecuted because he was impeached nay the House but not convicted by the Senate.
Legal experts and U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan have declared Trump is not immune from prosecution for criminal acts, with Judge Chutkan writing: “Defendant’s four-year service as Commander in Chief did not bestow on him the divine right of kings to evade the criminal accountability that governs his fellow citizens.”
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On Monday the Special Counsel appeared to have short-ciircuited Trump’s delay tactic by asking the Supreme Court to rule on this question: “Whether a former President is absolutely immune from federal prosecution for crimes committed while in office or is constitutionally protected from federal prosecution when he has been impeached but not convicted before the criminal proceedings begin.”
“It is hard for Trump to logically object to Smith’s request today for expedited Supreme Ct review since it is Trump who is claiming he [should] not be subject to the indictment at all,” writes former FBI general counsel Andrew Weissmann, a popular MSNBC legal analyst. “Expedited review only helps alleviate that harm, if he is correct (which he is not).”
Weissmann adds, “Note newest Smith team member: the storied appellate lawyer Michael Dreeben. Argued over 100 cases in Supreme Court, and was head appellate lawyer on SC Mueller team.”
“This is a really ballsy move,” declared former U.S. Attorney and Deputy Asst. Attorney General Harry Litman. “And who is Michael Dreeben? He plays a similar role in Mueller investigation but he was a very long time Deputy Solicitor General and probably the most respected Supreme Court advocate on criminal issues in the Dept.”
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Steve Vladeck, the national security attorney and professor of law, adds, “if I were taking a criminal procedure issue to the Court, there’s no one I’d want as my special counsel *more* than Michael Dreeben.”
He also explains, “The bottom line of Jack Smith’s #SCOTUS filing is that he wants to ensure, one way or the other, that the issue of Trump’s constitutional immunity from the January 6-related prosecution is conclusively resolved by the end of the Supreme Court’s *current* term (i.e., June 2024).”
“This is exactly the right move,” announced noted constitutional law scholar and Harvard University Professor Emeritus Laurence Tribe. “And SCOTUS should agree to leapfrog the DC Circuit, just as it did in the Nixon tapes case. The issue is purely legal and delay hurts the country.”
Former 30-year federal prosecutor Glenn Kirschner, now an NBC News/MSNBC legal analyst sums up the Special Counsel’s move: “Unwilling to play Trump’s stupid reindeer games, Jack Smith takes the reins and seeks an expedited answer from the Supreme Court on Trump’s baseless claim that he is above the law and can’t be prosecuted for his crimes.”
Watch Weissmann’s explanation of Smith’s move below or at this link.
MSNBC Legal Contributor Andrew Weissmann explains why Jack Smith’s direct appeal to the Supreme Court on the issue of Trump’s immunity claims is a “smart move.” pic.twitter.com/835W478Kpe
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) December 11, 2023
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Republicans Are Secretly Meeting With Allies of ‘Putin’s Buddy’ Orbán to End Ukraine Aid: Report
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