President-elect Donald Trump has given House Speaker Mike Johnson an ultimatum, saying if he doesn’t get tough, he will not be the Republican leader next Congress.
Trump said if Johnson ‘acts decisively and tough’ and overcomes ‘all of the traps being set by Democrats’ in negotiating a government funding deal he could ‘easily remain speaker.’
It comes after the speaker’s plan to extend government funding to March ahead of Friday’s deadline was derided by many, including Trump, Elon Musk and others, after being unveiled Tuesday night.
‘Anybody that supports a bill that doesn’t take care of the Democrat quicksand known as the debt ceiling should be primaried and disposed of as quickly as possible,’ the president-elect told Fox News Digital Thursday morning, issuing a clear warning.
‘If the speaker acts decisively, and tough, and gets rid of all of the traps being set by the Democrats, which will economically and, in other ways, destroy our country, he will easily remain speaker,’ he continued.
The demand to raise or suspend the debt ceiling, meanwhile, came late last night in a joint statement from Trump and VP-elect JD Vance – who worked late Wednesday night at the speaker’s office to help the House GOP leadership come to a deal before heading home around 10:00 pm, with his pajama-wearing children in tow.
Trump has berated House Republicans for trying to push through the bloated stop-gap government funding agreement, effectively killing the bipartisan effort to fund the government before the Christmas holiday.
House Speaker Mike Jonson and House Republicans are scrambling to revise the 1,547-page bill after Trump and conservative Republicans voiced their outrage by provisions in the measure.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump voiced his disappointment with the continuing resolution pushed by House Speaker Mike Johnson
Johnson has been forced to rethink his government funding strategy just before funding runs out Saturday
VP-elect JD Vance worked with the speaker until late Wednesday trying to strike a deal
Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., told reporters Wednesday evening that the deal was officially dead after Trump criticized the effort.
‘There is no new agreement right now, just, you know, obviously looking at a number of options,’ Scalise said after leaving a meeting. Now House GOP leadership is scrambling to come up with a deal with less than 48 hours until a shutdown.
Trump warned House Republicans against supporting the measure.
‘Any Republican that would be so stupid as to do this should, and will, be Primaried,’ he wrote on his TruthSocial platform.
The president-elect also appeared disappointed the bill did not address raising the debt limit, instead pushing it off for him to address after he became president.
‘This is a nasty trap set in place by the Radical Left Democrats! They are looking to embarrass us in June when it comes up for a Vote,’ he wrote.
The text of the continuing resolution was published Tuesday night, prompting conservative criticism for the bloated resolution loaded down with additional spending with hardly any time to read through it before members of Congress were expected to vote on it.
The bill includes additional disaster spending for communities hurt by Hurricane Helene but also includes pay raises for members of Congress and other unrelated spending priorities.
Originally Johnson proposed a 1,547-page plan, but that was quickly shot down by Elon Musk, who went on a campaign against the Republican leader’s plan on X
Elon Musk walks on Capitol Hill on the day of a meeting with Senate Republican Leader-elect John Thune (R-SD), in Washington, U.S. December 5, 2024. Musk has spoken to Johnson about the spending process
Democrats immediately protested Trumps’ criticism of the bill, warning that blowing up the agreement would lead to a government shutdown.
‘House Republicans have been ordered to shut down the government. And hurt the working class Americans they claim to support,’ House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said in a post responding to Trump’s opposition. ‘You break the bipartisan agreement, you own the consequences that follow.’
Earlier Wednesday, Trump issued a joint statement with Vice President-elect JD Vance criticizing the bill.
Trump’s close advisor Elon Musk also went on a full-out assault against the measure on social media, warning that the bill must not pass.
Speaker Mike Johnson worked with House Democrats to agree to the continuing resolution (CR) extending government funding until March.
If funding is not passed by Saturday, the government may partially shutdown.
But Trump told Republicans not to worry about that.
‘Republicans must get smart and tough,’ the Trump and Vance statement said. ‘If Democrats threaten to shut down the government unless we give them everything they want, then call their bluff.’
The Republican duo also signaled how they want Johnson to proceed, indicating they want a ‘clean CR,’ a bill without extra policy riders like disaster relief, money to combat growing Chinese influence, and raises for members of Congress that are in the current version.
‘We should pass a streamlined spending bill that doesn’t give Chuck Schumer and the Democrats everything they want,’ Trump and Vance said.
President-elect Donald Trump and Republican vice president-elect U.S. Sen. JD Vance
Elon Musk has been crusading against Republican Speaker Mike Johnson’s massive government spending package
However, another overarching proposal argued in the statement was that the incoming Republicans want Congress to address the debt ceiling.
On January 1, 2025, the debt ceiling will be reinstated after it was suspended in the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023.
It means Trump and his administration will have restrictions on how much it can ask Congress to spend right out of the gates.
‘The most foolish and inept thing ever done by Congressional Republicans was allowing our country to hit the debt ceiling in 2025. It was a mistake and is now something that must be addressed,’ their statement began.
‘Increasing the debt ceiling is not great but we’d rather do it on Biden’s watch,’ they continued. ‘If Democrats won’t cooperate on the debt ceiling now, what makes anyone think they would do it in June during our administration?’
In addition to signaling their distaste for Johnson’s bill, they are asking him to negotiate with Democrats to increase or further suspend the legal limit on how much debt the federal government can take on.
Exiting his Senate office on Wednesday, VP-elect Vance said: ‘The President believes is that we should support a clean CR so long as it contains a debt limit increase.’
‘That’s the position of the president and that’s what we’re going to try to push for,’ he added.
The super-sized CR touted by Johnson, meanwhile, extended government funding until March, basically kicking the issue down the road three months.
The 1,547-page CR is longer than most religious texts, like the Bible, and when stacked sheet-by-sheet the bill towers over a normal can of Diet Coke. Elon Musk has been slamming the CR as wasteful ‘pork’
After unveiling a massive spending bill Tuesday night, many Republicans have disapproved of Mike Johnson’s government funding plan
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., from left, walks with Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon Musk, who is carrying his son X as they arrive for a roundtable meeting to discuss President-elect Donald Trump’s planned Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Dec. 5, 2024
But it was met with heavy headwinds from disgruntled Republicans and members of Trump’s incoming Cabinet.
Billionaire Musk, who is heading up Trump’s DOGE agency with Vivek Ramaswamy, is led the charge to slap down the bill he calls a ‘piece of pork.’
He went so far as to threaten any Republican who votes for the measure, saying they’ll be fired from Congress next election.
‘Any member of the House or Senate who votes for this outrageous spending bill deserves to be voted out in 2 years!’ he wrote on X.
Later Musk wrote the successfully killed the speaker’s bill: ‘Your elected representatives have heard you and now the terrible bill is dead. The voice of the people has triumphed!’
Attached to the package is over $100 billion relief aid to help states reeling from disastrous hurricanes Milton and Helene.
It also provides farmers with assistance, approves cash for submarines, and helps with other disasters.
But Musk is taking issue with a provision to bump up members of Congress’ pay from $174,000 – a level set in 2009 – to $243,300 per year and other measures.
Musk has made numerous posts disparaging Johnson’s CR Wednesday morning
‘How can this be called a ‘continuing resolution’ if it includes a 40 percent pay increase for Congress?’ he questioned.
After the bill’s details were released on Tuesday night, Speaker Johnson, Musk and Vivek reportedly spoke about the contents in a group chat.
Then, after discussing the CR with the speaker, Musk, a close ally of Trump’s, began publicly deriding the Johnson’s plan that is also facing backlash from Republicans.
‘Ever seen a bigger piece of pork?’ Musk posted on X alongside a photo of the printed out spending plan, which pilled up stood taller than a can of Diet Coke.
‘This bill should not pass,’ he said in another tweet.
In another post Wednesday morning the X owner re-posted a proposal that suggested Congress should be forced to release bill details a week before voting on them. ‘Agreed!’ Musk wrote.
On Wednesday morning, after some of Musks barbs, Johnson addressed the criticism, noting how he was talking to the co-chairs via text last night about the CR.
‘I was communicating with Elon last night. Elon and Vivek and I are on the text chain together, and I was explaining to them the background of this,’ the speaker began.
Billions of dollars within the CR are meant to help with disaster relief following the damage from Hurricane Helene, shown above
‘They say, ‘This is not directed to you, Mr. Speaker, but we don’t like the spending.’ I said, guess what fellas? I don’t either,’ Johnson said.
The Republican leader recounted how Ramaswamy admitted Johnson was ‘in an impossible position’ and the speaker said he will be forced to rely on Democratic votes to get the CR passed.
‘We gotta get this thing done so we don’t have the shutdown… and we get to March where we can put our fingerprints on the spending,’ Johnson continued. ‘That’s when the big changes start.’
DOGE co-chair Ramaswamy also posted about the CR following its release Tuesday.
‘Currently reading the 1,547-page bill to fund the government through mid-March. Expecting every U.S. Congressman & Senator to do the same,’ he posted on X.
Many conservative Republicans have expressed their dismay with the final CR, one likening it to a ‘dumpster fire’ while another called it a ‘crap sandwich.’
Republican leadership is currently deciding on a time to bring the CR up for a vote, though when remains unclear.
The unpopular decision by Johnson will surely be top of mind when Republicans vote on who they want their next speaker to be come January.
Johnson has been thought to be a shoe-in to the role after Trump recently signaled his support of the Republican leader.
But now with Musk’s dissatisfaction hardline conservatives will have more ammo to use against the speaker should they mount an attack on his grip on the gavel next year.
