House Speaker Mike Johnson’s wife is collecting a salary from a religious nonprofit that ministers to young congressional staffers, but she won’t say who's bankrolling it.
Kelly Johnson, a faith-based counselor, refocused her Louisiana nonprofit, Onward Christian Education Services, on Washington after her husband took the gavel in 2023, reported the Washington Post.
According to an IRS filing, the group’s new mission is to help “the hundreds of unreached young women” working around Capitol Hill to “find purpose, belonging, and Christian community.” Through the group, she offers free counseling, gives speeches and leads “spiritual heritage tours” of the Capitol that highlight the nation’s Christian history.
“I’m a missionary here,” she told the Post. “It’s kind of a calling in this life for me.”
Financial disclosures show the nonprofit paid her $50,000 in 2024 for roughly 10 hours of work a week, and her salary makes up almost 90 percent of everything the group has spent since it was founded in 2019.
The source of the funding is unclear, according to a Post review. In its early years, the group took in an average of more than $60,000 a year in contributions, but donor names are redacted in public filings.
Johnson described “several large benefactors” who are “primarily just individuals who have an interest in this and have a heart in this.” She declined to name them, wouldn’t say whether they also give to her husband’s campaigns and refused to give the Post unredacted records.
In 2024, the nonprofit reported no revenue at all, yet it still paid Johnson her full salary, which drew its reserves down to $5,797. She said she had been too busy with her husband’s new job to fundraise.
The group’s paperwork has also been spotty. It filed nothing with the IRS for its first three years and paid $6,475 in penalties. It went another two years without filing until a Post reporter asked for the records. Johnson, who also keeps the books, left her own salary off a 2023 form and has revised earlier revenue figures without explanation.
Ethics experts told the Post the ministry’s purpose isn’t the issue, but they expressed concerns about how closely it is tied to the speaker’s office.
“It should make everyone uncomfortable that the speaker’s wife would be raising money for a mission to serve congressional staff,” said Meredith McGehee, a longtime advocate for campaign finance transparency. “It really dances on that blurred line of separation of church and state and using public resources for private interests.”
Philip Hackney, a nonprofit law professor at the University of Pittsburgh, wondered whether donors could use the organization to gain access to the speaker. “Is it serving a political purpose or is it serving an actual charity?” he asked.
Davina Hurt of Santa Clara University warned that young aides could feel obliged to take part. “If you want to advance through the ranks, you will feel pressure to some degree,” she said.
A spokesman for the speaker said no staffer has ever been pressured to participate, and Mike Johnson praised his wife’s work, saying she “has a true gift with people.”