House Speaker Mike Johnson Wednesday was forced to respond to President Donald Trump's cruel comments on Hollywood legend Rob Reiner following the news that he and his wife were murdered.
Trump attacked Reiner, who was found stabbed to death with his wife Michele inside their Brentwood, California home, in a Truth Social post. He tried to suggest that Reiner's “massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME" was responsible for his death.
In an interview with CNBC's Squawk Box, Johnson finally responded — and blamed the Capitol Hill press corps. — to questions about the president's remarks after journalist Andrew Ross Sorkin asked him to share his thoughts, prefacing it by saying he wouldn't "love" the question.
"Well, I did comment at length. They just didn't replay that part," Johnson said. "No, no, no surprise here. Capitol hill press corps. But what I said was straight from the heart. I heard about it coming out of an event in the morning when the news broke. And my comment was that, I mean, obviously it's an unspeakable family tragedy. And the Reiner family, I mean, just a horrible thing to think of."
Johnson cited a Bible verse and Sorkin pushed back again, asking Johnson to address the president's comments.
“Look, I know I’m asked to give running commentary on everything that the president says every five minutes of the day, as well as all of my colleagues here," said Johnson, who appeared frustrated by the question.
“I don’t communicate the same way,” he said. “I am my own person, and I speak, you know, from my voice.”
“The president and I address issues differently sometimes,” Johnson said. “That’s not the way I would have done it. It’s not the way I have done it. You know, that’s my comment on it.”
People reacted to Johnson's comments on social media:
"I think I just heard a single vertebra!" user Jeremy Winter wrote on X.
"Real profiles-in-courage moment, Skippy," University of Illinois Assistant Director of Communications professor Vince Lara-Cinisomo wrote on X.
"Evasion speaks loudly. When pressed on rhetoric, leaders face a choice: clarify, condemn, or deflect. Accountability starts with direct answers," journalist Qadir Khan Yousufzai wrote on X.
"You condemn his vile and immoral remarks Mike. That is what leadership of the House should do," user Lee West wrote on X.
"He didn’t 'love' that question so it had to asked again; just to give him the chance to give the weakest ass response imaginable," film sound editor John Kwiatkowski wrote on X.