In a post-mortem on how House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) negotiated and cajoled his caucus into passing what Donald Trump has called his "big beautiful bill," details are coming out from Politico on how he used Donald Trump to seal the deal with his special brand of bullying.
According to a report from Politico's Rachel Bade, Johnson spent months hammering out details and left some of the tougher calls until the end, which aggravated some House Republicans, where push came to shove as Trump lowered the boom on the balkers, with one insider stating, "He let them have it.".
According to insiders who witnessed the GOP meeting with Trump, the president took delight in making personal attacks on recalcitrant lawmakers.
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Calling them "grandstanders," Trump stunned one "bewildered" House member who admitted, "He insulted several people with a great intensity."
According to Bade, "Trump’s tongue lashings and Johnson’s hardball approach to muscling the bill through this week rattled some even long-time GOP lawmakers. It was clear there was no room for dissent," leading to one Republican lawmaker to claim, "I could never have imagined when I started in politics that we would have this kind of a scenario,” before lamenting, “But who else do we turn to, besides Johnson?”
With everything done and now to be negotiated with Senate Republicans, one Johnson associate praised the bullying tactics and bluntly claimed, "They always fold."
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