On Tuesday morning outside a Manhattan courthouse, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) gave a spirited defense of former President Donald Trump, who is currently on trial over alleged hush money payments made to adult film star Stormy Daniels and model Karen McDougal. He is accused of falsifying business records in relation to the payments.
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While speaking with the press, Johnson was adamant in his condemnation of the charges against Trump, saying he is “disgusted by what is happening here, what is being done here to our entire system of justice overall.” He argued that “the people are losing faith right now in this country, in our institutions. They’re losing faith in our system of justice.”
The facts here are very important. Facts are always important in a trial, or at least they’re supposed to be. The president’s actions in this matter were previously reviewed, and no charges were filed. Why is that? Because there’s no crime here. Now, eight years later, suddenly, they’ve resurrected this thing. They brought it back. And why is that? Well, just apply common sense. Everyone can see. It’s painfully obvious they were now six months out from an election day. And that’s the reason. That is the reason why they brought these charges here and across the country.
The speaker continued, noting that “what we’ve got here is a partisan Democrat district attorney, we have a Biden donor judge, and we have an assistant DA who was recently a top official at the Department of Justice, Biden’s DOJ, and recently received over $10,000 in payments from the Democratic National Committee.”
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Johnson turned his attention to the prosecution’s “star witness,” former Trump attorney Michael Cohen.
I just listened to a few moments of his testimony this morning, and it is consistent with what he’s already done. This is a man who is clearly on a mission for personal revenge and who is widely known as a witness who has trouble with the truth. He is someone who has a history of perjury and is well known for it. No one should believe a word he says today. He lied to Congress. He lied to the IRS. He lied to federal election officials. Even Cohen’s own lawyer testified to a grand jury that he is not reliable. So there’s nothing that he presents here that should be given any weight at all by a jury, and certainly not this judge.
The speaker also criticized Judge Juan Merchan for slapping a gag order on Trump, suggesting it was a politically motivated strategic move to hamper the former president’s ability to campaign. “They are overriding his constitutional right to defend himself from political smears from his harshest critics at the most important time,” Johnson said, also referring to the gag order as “election interference.”
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Other high-profile Republicans like Sens. Rick Scott (R-FL), J.D. Vance (R-OH), and Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) have also shown up at the trial to show their support for Trump.