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Exactly one year ago tomorrow, House Speaker Mike Johnson argued in writing, “America is the most compassionate nation in the world, but our immigration system is broken. Reforming that system is a job for Congress.” There was no ambiguity: The Louisiana Republican wanted lawmakers to tackle the issue.
Johnson was relatively consistent on the issue. In October 2023, the speaker said, “[W]e must come together and address the broken border.” In December 2023 — just a couple of months ago — the GOP leader wrote to President Joe Biden, stressing the need for “statutory reforms.”
When Democratic leaders, including Biden, ultimately agreed to sweeping reforms and endorsed bipartisan legislative changes, Johnson moved the goalposts: Forget legislation, the House speaker effectively said, the White House should tackle the issue through executive actions.
In fact, Johnson complained a month ago the president’s reluctance to take executive actions on border policy reflected a degree of bad faith on the administration’s part: If Biden were sincerely interested in addressing the issue, he’d take unilateral action, instead of pushing Congress to take the kind of steps Johnson wanted Congress to take before he changed his mind.
This week, with the door apparently closed on legislative solutions, there were multiple reports about the White House “exploring options that President Joe Biden could deploy on his own without congressional approval.”
So, the House speaker must be delighted, right? Wrong: Johnson is moving the goalposts again. Politico reported on the Republican leader complaining about Biden preparing to take the steps he urged Biden to take.
Speaker Mike Johnson is blasting the Biden administration’s consideration of executive action to limit migrant crossings at the border as “election year gimmicks.” ... “The president suddenly seems interested in trying to make a change using the legal authority that he claimed until recently didn’t exist,” Johnson (R-La.) said in a statement first obtained by POLITICO.
So let me see if I have this straight. The House speaker criticized Biden for not taking executive action on border policy, and he also criticized Biden for preparing to take executive action on border policy? Johnson wanted the president to use executive powers as sign of good faith, and Johnson also believes the president using executive powers would be a sign of bad faith?
In 1932, Groucho Marx sang a song with memorable lyrics:
I don’t know what they have to say,
It makes no difference anyway,
Whatever it is, I’m against it.
No matter what it is or who commenced it,
I’m against it.
Your proposition may be good,
But let’s have one thing understood,
Whatever it is, I’m against it.
And even when you’ve changed it or condensed it,
I’m against it.
It’s hard not to wonder whether anyone in the speaker’s office heard the song and took the lyrics a bit too seriously.