Speaker Johnson slams Harris and Walz on the trail in Minneapolis
From CNN’s Aileen Graef
House Speaker Mike Johnson on Sunday sharply criticized Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, as he works to expand the slim Republican majority in the House and make the case for former President Donald Trump.
Speaking in Minneapolis alongside Joe Teirab, who is looking to flip the House seat held by Democratic Rep. Angie Craig, Johnson used the backdrop of the Police Department’s Third Precinct to criticize Walz’s handling of the protests that erupted after the murder of George Floyd in 2020. The Third Precinct was burned during the protests.
“Tim Walz and Democrats in Minnesota allowed Minneapolis to burn for nearly an entire day before doing anything at all, and this, of course, was after rioters had taken over the Third Precinct right here behind me and fires burned across the city,” Johnson told reporters.
Trump and his allies have frequently cited the Minneapolis protests in their criticism of Walz. The former president has claimed that it was he who deployed the Minnesota National Guard in response to the protests. Walz, not Trump, sent the National Guard to Minneapolis — and Walz first deployed the Guard more than seven hours before Trump publicly threatened to do so.
Johnson also said he expected the Democratic “sugar high” to subside in the presidential polls after Labor Day.
“I mean, obviously, the Democrats are on a sugar high. Everybody’s acknowledged that. And I think that that gets real after Labor Day,” the Louisiana Republican said, adding, “I think that Kamala Harris is about to be put to the real test.”
Johnson also defended the GOP for tanking the bipartisan immigration bill supported by the Biden administration. The bill has been a key target for Democrats trying to change the narrative on border security.
“That bill was terribly flawed. It was not a border security bill. It was an immigration policy bill. We do need to fix the immigration system, but you need bipartisan support from both chambers of Congress to work that out, because it’s very complicated,” he said.
