Outgoing House Speaker Mike Johnson offered an explanation for the GOP's midterm wipeout that one progressive host called uniquely revealing.
Johnson (R-LA) blamed the voters themselves, telling CNN's Manu Raju on Capitol Hill that he was "sorry that the voters made the wrong choice." On Tuesday's episode of "The David Pakman Show," host David Pakman called it "maybe the most revealing thing any Republican has said since the election."
Raju had asked Johnson whether President Donald Trump needed to change course after the party's heavy losses. Johnson declined to weigh in. "I'm not going to tell the president how to do his job," Johnson said. "We have an incredible record of the first two years of his term, and I expect more success in the days ahead."
The speaker also predicted turmoil once Democrats take over the House. "I really do believe that these next two years are going to be a bit of a circus. It's going to be chaos," he said, later adding that "if we had kept the majority, we would stay on course to continue delivering for the people."
Pakman, who opened the segment by labeling Johnson "a profile in cowardice," said the speaker offered "no introspection" about why voters rejected the GOP.
"The point of an election is voters make a choice," Pakman said. "You don't have to like it."
Pakman argued voters had plenty of reasons to punish Republicans, pointing to the costly war with Iran, higher energy prices and persistent worries about affordability. "Have you considered maybe voters looked at the work you had been doing and said, 'We don't want more of it'?" he said. "We want to stop you from doing more of that work."
He also knocked the GOP-led Congress for acting as an extension of Trump rather than a check on him. "It wasn't an independent branch of the government. They had no interest in oversight," Pakman said.
Johnson's refusal to say anything critical of the president fit a familiar pattern, according to Pakman. "His entire political identity at this point is I don't tell Trump what to do. I defend anything that Donald Trump does," he said.