Have you ever been embarrassed by someone’s hypocrisy and conscious lying?
I have. It’s over Speaker of the House Rep. Michael Johnson’s claim of being a Christian, while neither his words nor his actions have come anywhere near to the teachings of Christ. He’s giving Christianity a bad name and it angers me.
The Speaker of the House has been given great power to do good or to do evil. His decisions affect millions of people. There are three areas that especially bother me about Speaker Johnson.
The first area of concern is his constant lying.
For months Johnson stated that there would not be cuts to Medicaid or food assistance programs such as SNAP. His claim was that he wanted to get rid of “waste, fraud, and abuse”. Yet, in the “ One Big Beautiful Bill”, Congress is set to cut between $863 billion to $1.02 trillion dollars from Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) over the next ten years. (https://factually.co/fact-checks/politics/how-much-did-big-beautiful-bill-cut-medicaid-4f5e8b)
Speaker Johnson focuses his talking points on several arguments. One is getting rid of able-bodied young men receiving SNAP benefits who are gaming the system while refusing to work. In actuality, 42 million people nationwide receive SNAP benefits. In Washington State, that amounts to 883,300 residents (11% of the state population).
“53% of SNAP participants are in families with children. More than 38% are in families with members who are older adults or are disabled. More than 37% are in working families” (https://www.cbpp.org/research/food-assistance/a-closer-look-at-who-benefits-from-snap-state-by-state-fact-sheets#Washington).
Another talking point Speaker Johnson uses is the allegation that Democrats favor giving aid to illegal immigrants. This is a blatant lie. According to USAFacts.org “Since 1996, access to many federal programs has been limited to citizens and people that the law defines as ‘qualified aliens’— such as green card holders, refugees, and asylees.” The Speaker knows this, and yet has lied to the American public.
“Bearing false witness” is considered a sin in the Hebrew scriptures. Proverbs 28:27 states: “Whoever oppresses a poor man insults his Maker, but he who is generous to the needy honors him.” Johnson also ignores Jesus’ words in Matthew 25:35: “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me….”
The second area of concern is his refusal to swear in newly elected Democratic representative Adelita Grijalva from Arizona. Speaker Johnson has already sworn in two Republican representatives during pro-forma sessions when the House was not meeting. He is refusing to swear her in because she has stated she will be the 218th representative to vote for the discharge petition to reveal the Epstein files. These files will be extremely damaging to the president.
By the time you read this she will likely have waited over 40 days. Johnson has deflected answering the question by referring to former Speaker Nancy Pelosi who delayed a swearing in. Yet, Speaker Pelosi’s case was due to the representative’s own request for a delay to a certain date. This is another example of lying and dishonesty. Neither are Christian values.
The third area of concern is Speaker Johnson pressuring Democrats to capitulate to reopening the government by blaming them for the loss of SNAP payments during the shutdown.
The Democrats are refusing to vote for the budget bill because they want to restore Medicaid healthcare benefits to the poor. These payments were eliminated by passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill. Johnson and the Republicans in the Senate are using cutting off food (SNAP) payments to force the Democrats to choose between starvation and healthcare for the poor.
Speaker Johnson claims to be a Christian, but his embarrassing and hypocritical actions make Christianity look bad. He is a heartless and cruel liar who would rather give tax breaks to the super wealthy and run up the national debt by $3.4 trillion dollars over ten years than to care for his own Louisiana constituents with food assistance and medical care. His claim to being a Christian was undoubtedly a successful ploy to convince Christians to elect him. His actions indicate that power trumps compassion and integrity and his professed Christian beliefs.
To equate Speaker Michael Johnson with Christian behavior is like equating a skunk’s smell to the smell of vanilla.
