New House Speaker Mike Johnson Faces Challenge In Aid Package Negotiations

New Republican Speaker of the House Mike Johnson is facing numerous challenges in his new role, including working with the Senate and President Biden on a major aid package, which is likely to be the first real test of Johnson’s relatively untested leadership skills.

As much as anything, how Johnson (R-LA) handles the aid package will give the far-right Republicans who helped engineer his election an early indication of whether his strength of character and commitment to principle that won them over can withstand the pressures of high-stakes negotiating.

“We can’t be milquetoast," said Rep. Josh Brecheen (R-OK2) in an interview just prior to Johnson’s election on Wednesday. “The American people are tired of that; they are tired of the status quo.”

The selection of Johnson as Speaker was certainly a jab at the status quo, putting in office a Louisiana lawyer unknown to most Americans, but who knows there's urgent work to be done.

“The hour is late, the crisis is great, and America, we hear you.”

But on the question of supporting an aid package that will have international repercussions, whose voices will Johnson take most to heart?

The aid package reportedly came up Thursday when the Speaker met at the White House with Biden and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY). As proposed, Biden’s package would send $61 billion in military and economic assistance to Ukraine, $14 billion to Israel, and allocate another $14 billion to enhance security on the southern border.

Johnson has voted against Ukraine aid in the past and is likely to feel pressure from the Freedom Caucus and others on this latest proposal.

“I don’t think we ought to bring up a Ukraine bill that doesn’t have the majority of Republican support,” Rep. Bob Good (R-VA) told reporters Wednesday afternoon.

Other Republicans, however, while looking to lower the total cost of the package, feel strongly it must include Ukraine.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) this week said there are some things he’d like to change in the package, but feels aid for Ukraine should be included right along with aid for Israel and funding for the border.

“I do think it needs to be comprehensive,” he said. “I think it needs to deal with all of these because they’re all interrelated.”

If Republicans do agree to keep Ukraine aid in the package, some observers feel they may simultaneously make greater demands on the border piece and that that might be the only way that Speaker Johnson agrees to move it through the House.