meanwhile as house Speaker Mike Johnson faces Mutiny within his own party over the government funding package deal last week Democrats are discussing what they can get out of the speaker to save his job the hills reporting that should far-right Republicans attempt to coup against their own speaker Democrats could offer to save him if Johnson then acts on the already passed Senate Ford a package that package of course includes billions in aid for Ukraine Israel Taiwan as well as humanitarian assi
stance for Gaza joining us now Congressional reporter for the hill Michael Schnell who's been so carefully covering this so Michael tell us how this would work we saw a similar strategy when Kevin McCarthy was facing an aser and that deal fell apart do we think Johnson would accept it would he be willing to take Democrats help to keep his job in order to get that funding to Ukraine and others yeah Jonathan that's the big question here would Johnson rather not be speaker or be a speaker that was
in a way protected by democrats that's the big question here but look if this motion to vacate does come to fruition congresswoman margerie Taylor green filed it on Friday said that she could force a vote on it at any time in the near future if she does go ahead with that a number of Democrats that I've spoken to over the past several days are prepared to step in and protect Johnson and that would happen if he moves forward with Ukraine and of course assistance for keev has stalled on Capitol Hi
ll for months now the president put out his supplemental request around September August of last year that has not moved in the house because Johnson is facing a number of conservative Republicans who are apprehensive to send more assistance to keeve so now what we're seeing some Democrats say is Speaker Johnson if you move on this Aid or if you putting a Ukraine Aid package on the floor is the reason why you face an ouster we will come in and protect you and look that may not look like Democrat
s voting for speaker Johnson on the house floor but there are some procedural things that could go down a motion to table the motion to vacate would likely come to the floor Democrats could vote to table that and if enough do it and it has a majority of the chamber that would essentially be quashed and the house could move on with legislative business but of course the main question here is would Johnson put that ukraini it on the table and does he want to be a speaker that was in essence protec
ted by democrats a lot of key questions will be watching as Congressman green continues to dangle this motion to vacate and house of course out next week as well so we won't have any movement on this just yet but Michael uh if if Johnson goes for this deal and he puts the Ukraine funding on the table um what does the rest of his speakership look like where many Republicans including those in the far right would probably say well he's just beholden to the Democrats and probably try to OU him agai
n would would we' have been a dynamic where Democrats would have continually tried to save him how does Johnson possibly govern his own conference I mean that's another key question here Jonathan of course a lot of unknowns right now as we're waiting to see if this motion to vac comes to the floor what Johnson does and how Democrats ultimately react I think there there are two ways as this could go forward a you're definitely going to hear from conservative Republicans saying that this is a demo
cratic speaker speaker Johnson propped up by liberals that's the only reason why he's in this position but let's also remember the current Dynamics right now in Washington right we have a divided city where the Senate and the White House is controlled by Democrats and Republicans are just hanging on to the house by a thread next month Congressman Mike Gallagher set to retire early that means that Republicans are going to have just a one vote margin in the house now it was difficult for them to g
et anything done when they had that four- seat cushion now let's talk about how much more difficult it's going to be when they have that one seat Edge so it's very possible that if Johnson has to go down this route of passing Ukraine Aid and getting help from Democrats his response can be well look this is divided government you know if we had a bigger majority if we would have done better in the 2022 midterm elections we wouldn't be in this situation we'd be handling let islative issues in a ve
ry different manner but we have a very small majority in a divided Washington this is how things are right now hey everyone MSNBC has a new and improved app you'll get realtime alerts and Analysis live blogs in-depth essays video highlights and the best 2024 election coverage download the new MSNBC app here's how to do it you tap on the App Store on your phone you hit search on the bottom right corner you type in MSNBC you click on the MSNBC app you click on get or the cloud icon and enjoy it
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