(Ken Silva, Headline USA) When Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La., won the House speakership two weeks ago, he quickly announced that his first move would be to introduce legislation to provide foreign aid to Israel.
That didn’t sit too well with conservative commentator Tucker Carlson, who blasted Johnson for seemingly abandoning his America-first principles.
“The new Speaker of the House comes in and the first thing he does is issues a statement on behalf of a foreign country. That’s the most important thing—and I’m not even against the statement—but I’m just saying, ‘What bigger statement does that make?’” Carlson said on a podcast with comedian Theo Von, which was released Tuesday.
“If you think the welfare of another country is the most important thing for you as one of the leaders of our country—third in line for the presidency—you have lost the thread, son. Because it’s not. Nothing is more important to the leaders of our country than our country and how its 350 million people are doing,” Carlson continued. “So I was enraged by that.”
Carlson then defended himself from the knee-jerk criticism he’s received from people such as neocon Ben Shapiro, who have painted anyone skeptical of aiding Israel’s war as being pro-Hamas.
“People are like, ‘Oh you’re for Hamas?’ Of course I’m not for Hamas, at all. I’m for America, actually. I shouldn’t even have to answer that question,” he said. “Obviously I’m for Israel over Hamas, but that’s irrelevant. I’m for America. And no one even asks that, and I feel deep resentment over that.”
Other members of the MAGA wing of the GOP have come to Johnson’s defense. Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., for instance, pointed out that Johnson is leading the charge to separate Israel aid from Ukraine aid—though Johnson has also flip-flopped on that issue, now saying that he supports aiding Biden’s proxy war against Russia.
“McCarthy wanted to lash Ukraine and Israel money together. Johnson says we will do them separate (that’s not what Ukraine wanted!),” Gaetz said on Twitter last week.
Meanwhile, Johnson’s $14 billion aid proposal for Israel is receiving pushback due to his desire to offset the spending with cuts to the Internal Revenue Service. Johnson’s proposal runs against the White House’s desired $105 billion demand, which would bundle military aid to Israel, Ukraine and Taiwain.
According to The Hill, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.), who is Jewish, railed against Johnson’s proposal, saying she was “deeply disturbed” and describing it as an “unprecedented offset.”
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.
