Scalise Celebrates Election of Speaker Mike Johnson

Press Release

"Well, this is a great day. This is a day that's been coming for a long time. You know, if you think about what's happened these last three weeks, while a lot of people outside of Washington talk about dysfunction, this great group of men and women behind me have been talking about how to fix what's broken in Washington. And hasn't that discussion been coming for way too long? That's what this last three weeks has been about. That's what we have been struggling through. That's what we've been working towards. And we resolved it today by electing Mike Johnson as our next speaker.

And what [Speaker Johnson] laid out was a vision. [It] wasn't just core principles that he talked about today on the House floor so eloquently, but a vision for how we get not just the House back operating, but how we get Washington working better, how we fix this broken institution.

And how symbolic -- [Speaker Johnson] talked in the House chamber about the symbolism of the House chamber: Moses, "In God We Trust' right above the Speaker's rostrum, so many other symbols, Washington, Lafayette, the history of some of the great battles, passing the 13th Amendment in that chamber. But if you look up at this Capitol dome that serves as a beacon to so many -- not just here in America, but all around the world -- interestingly, in the last three weeks, the statue of freedom was covered in scaffolding, just like we have been doing construction to fix this broken institution. How symbolic that the scaffolding is now coming down as we elected a new speaker to fix this institution that's had problems for decades that needed to be addressed and went ignored for way too long?

I have seen this man in action since I was a state representative. For those people that don't know Mike Johnson, maybe they're looking to Google, maybe they're looking to other places. But those of us who have known [Speaker] Mike Johnson for a long time -- and I've known him maybe longer than most -- I've seen a commitment, a [selfless] service commitment to things bigger than himself going back to my days in the statehouse, and when he came to Congress, those same principles followed him. His belief, his faith that drives him so deeply, that some actually mock him for -- those are the principles that make this country so great. Those are the principles that cause people who believe in freedom all around the world to look up at that statue of freedom as a beacon of hope for all around the world.

And what [Speaker] Mike Johnson is going to do for us and our country, getting us back on track. We are just getting started, but people are going to come to know and love what he represents because he fights for things bigger than himself and people who have been ignored for way too long. It is my great privilege to introduce the [56th] Speaker of the House, my dear friend Mike Johnson, the speaker."

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