Marjorie Taylor Greene’s attempt to oust Speaker Mike Johnson tabled by House

WASHINGTON — Marjorie Taylor Greene on Wednesday called up a resolution to oust Speaker Mike Johnson, hoping to force a vote to remove the Louisiana Republican. However, the Georgia representative’s effort was killed as House members voted to table the motion to vacate.

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Johnson: Motion was ‘distraction’

Update 6:28 p.m. EDT May 8: House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters that a “functioning Congress” was necessary to pass legislation important to conservatives and downplayed the aborted attempt by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene to oust him.

“Hopefully this is the end of the personality politics and the frivolous character assassination that has defined the 118th Congress,” Johnson, R-La., told reporters, according to CNN. “It’s regrettable, it’s not who we are as Americans and we’re better than this.”

House votes to table Greene’s motion

Update 5:53 p.m. EDT May 8: The House overwhelmingly voted to table Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s motion to vacate.

The vote was 359-43, with seven House members voting present.

Only 11 Republicans supported Greene’s motion, while 196 GOP members voted to keep Johnson as speaker, The Washington Post reported. On the Democrats’ side of the aisle, 163 voted to table and 32 opposed it.

“Given a choice between advancing Republican priorities or allying with Democrats to preserve his own personal power, Johnson regularly chooses to ally himself with Democrats,” Greene said before the vote was taken.

It was the second time in less than a year the Republicans have attempted to oust their own speaker, The New York Times reported. Seven months ago, Republicans ousted Kevin McCarthy as speaker, the only person in U.S. congressional history to be removed.

Original report: The longshot move by the Georgia representative, while a major challenge to Johnson’s leadership, is expected to fail as Democrats are expected to support the speaker.

Now that Greene has begun the process, the House must consider the issue within two legislative days, CNN reported.

As soon as Greene filed her motion, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., moved to table the vote, The Washington Post reported. That would effectively kill Greene’s effort.

The motion by Greene came days after she and Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., met with the speaker to outline demands to accept, threatening to trigger a motion to vacate if he did not comply, according to the newspaper.

The two representatives wanted Johnson to no longer favor sending aid to Ukraine, defund any Justice Department investigations into former President Donald Trump, and pass a dozen individual spending bills or institute a 1% cut across government agencies, the Post reported.

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