Mike Johnson Has Lost the Moral Narrative

By Reverend Dr. William J. Barber, II & Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove –

MAGA’s Mike Johnson built his whole political career on an appeal to the moral high ground. Raised in Shreveport, Louisiana’s Southern Baptist culture, he was a member of the first generation of Southerners to inherit the Religious Right’s framing of reactionary politics as “religious” rather than “racist.”

Strom Thurmond and George Wallace had told Johnson’s parents that segregation was a political good that godly people must use political power to defend. Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson taught Johnson’s generation to pursue the same control of government in the name of “traditional values.”

A thespian in high school, Johnson honed the skills he needed to play the part of the appropriately humble Christian crusader for causes that religious nationalists named as good and holy. He became a lawyer and spent most of his career making Constitutional arguments for a narrow set of cultural wedge issues that evolved with the needs of each national election.

When attacking gay marriage was the rally cry of the right, he defended it in court. When “religious liberty” became a tactic for white Christians who believed they were persecuted to argue that they did not have to comply with federal law, Johnson was there to litigate. He summed up his legal career as a series of cases devoted to “defending religious freedom, the sanctity of human life, and biblical values, including the defense of traditional marriage, and other ideals like these when they’ve been under assault.”

After the rise of the Tea Party, Johnson continued to play his part as a righteous crusader, riding this moral narrative to public office in Louisiana and then to the US Congress in 2016—the same year that Donald Trump was elected President for the first time with the endorsement of religious nationalists.

If Trump was the unrighteous “King Cyrus” who religious nationalists believed their god could use to impose his agenda, Johnson was the faithful Christian soldier who would make sure that every head was bowed when it came time to bless the nation.

But Johnson’s faithful service to MAGA’s would-be king has exposed the bankruptcy of the false moral narrative that he has championed his whole public life.

The Speaker of the House who claims that his career has been about defending the sanctity of life and biblical values now finds himself in the position of holding food for hungry children hostage so his party can take healthcare away from millions of Americans.

This defender of “religious liberty” has slashed Medicaid to finance masked men who shoot unarmed pastors with pepper balls on the streets of Chicago. When asked at his press availability how he justifies this violation of free speech and religious freedom, Johnson can only answer, “I don’t know,” and “I’m not aware of the details.” After keeping the House shuttered for more than six weeks, he insists that he is “too busy” to pay attention to the policy violence that he has enabled.

After decades of arguing that “Thou shalt not lie” should be inscribed on the walls of America’s courts, Johnson willingly lies to the American people every day.

Having ceded the role of Speaker to Trump, Johnson finds himself serving as spokesperson for an increasingly unpopular government shutdown. With every passing day, he’s sinking deeper into a moral quagmire. He isn’t robbing Peter to pay Paul—something poor people know a lot about—but rather robbing the hungry and stealing healthcare from the low-income workers so that Trump’s rich friends can have a party at Mar-a-Lago to celebrate their record profits at a bacchanal that would make Johnson’s church friends blush.

In the New Testament, St. Paul uses the word “anathema” to keep from cussing when he describes this kind of religious hypocrisy. Today, most people look at what Mike Johnson is doing and say, “That’s just wrong.”

Last week, we were at the US Capitol with a Moral Monday delegation to share the stories of people who are directly impacted by the extreme cuts to nutrition assistance and healthcare that Johnson pushed through Congress this summer. Because we know this is a moral issue, we asked to meet with leadership from both sides of the aisle.

Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) hosted our delegation for over a hour and invited six of his colleagues to listen with him before holding a press conference to share what they’d heard. We’ve shared that story, “How This Government Shutdown Ends,” at Our Moral Moment page on Substack, ourmoralmoment.substack.com/p/how-this-government-shutdown-ends.

NOTE: The views and opinions expressed here, as well as assertions of facts, are those of the author. They do not necessarily represent the views or opinions of The Urban News.

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