LIVE: House Speaker, GOP Leadership Hold Press Conference (Feb. 11)

How are you? Good? Ready for Snowmageddon? Question is, are we going to get it today or not? We were supposed to get a bunch of snow last week and we didn't, but... Well, come on. Hey, that's for later. Jeez. Thank you all for being here. Republicans are making America secure and competitive. This week, we will pass two bills, one that could help deport illegal aliens who threaten our security. The other will reverse some burdensome regulations. Meanwhile, instead of joining us in making America secure and competitive, deranged Democrats are costing security guards outside federal buildings, interfering with ICE deporting illegal aliens, and even providing instructions on how to evade deportation. Guess what they say is the new constitutional crisis? Ending taxpayer funding for sex changes in Guatemala and other outrageous initiatives. Give me a break. Come on. 77 million people rejected the insanity last November, and they still are defending it. Hopefully, they will continue to defend this insanity. Speaking of defending insanity, the government is bloated. President Trump and House Republicans will right size it. We want to make America more competitive. And the left is outraged. Why aren't they outraged when a father of four gets laid off because of government overreach? Most people never get the option to have a buyout when their business is forced to close. But when it's a government employee making north of six figures who doesn't even show up to the office, Democrats lose their minds. They didn't seem to mind when Democrat President Bill Clinton offered thousands of federal employee buyouts. Millions of Americans are cheering for these cuts to waste, fraud, and abuse. Only extreme Democrats seem to have issue with it. Additionally, those millions of Americans are cheering for President Trump's tariff negotiations. It has proven his effectiveness in this arena time and time again, and this one will be no different. President Trump is sending a message to the world, and it's really simple. Compete fairly or pay the price. His negotiations will level the playing field and make America competitive again. Now, turning our attention to this week, another key issue House Republicans are focused on is making America secure. The House will honor the life of fallen Border Patrol Officer Raul Gonzalez. The bill named after him would prevent illegal immigrants who flee Border Patrol from ever being admitted into the United States. Officer Gonzalez lost his life in a high-speed chase near the border. He was chasing fleeing illegal immigrants. Let me be clear. Illegal immigrants who flee Border Patrol should never get a green card. It is unfortunate that 154 Democrats disagreed when they voted against the similar bill last Congress. They are voting against America's security, but they have another chance, because this week we will pass the Agent Raul Gonzalez Officer Safety Act with or without their support. It is a shame that Democrats want to reward these illegal criminals. But while Republicans want to detain, deport, and keep them from threatening our communities, we will do just that. This is common sense legislation. And if you cross the border illegally and cause harm during a high-speed chase, you should never be admitted to the United States or offered asylum. This bill sends a message to illegal aliens, drug traffickers, and smugglers, the bad guys. You threaten the American lives and you will face the full consequences of the law. We must protect our law enforcement officers. Six other agents died that same year as Officer Raul Gonzalez did. Imagine for a moment getting that call that your loved one wouldn't be returning home because they were chasing someone who was here illegally. And then, to top it off, the illegal aliens that they were chasing were allowed to stay here. It's terrible, it's disgusting, and it won't continue. Who in their right mind could support this? We will find out later this week. And I would suggest maybe the Democrats that vote against this bill can start calling the loved ones of the fallen officers. Perhaps that's a good idea, and maybe that would change their mind. I'm not sure if it would. Now we're gonna hear from a member who knows firsthand the devastating impact of the border crisis, another patriot wanting to make America secure. And now I turn it over to my friend, Rep. Abe Hammaday from Arizona. Thank you, Chairwoman, and thank you to the leadership team, Speaker Johnson, Leader Scalise, and Whip Emmer, and Chairwoman McClain. You all have been fantastic. I've been prioritizing the border since day one, since I took office on January 3rd. And we know that President Trump, that's his first actions as well. And as a former prosecutor from Arizona and a veteran myself, I know that keeping our communities safe is the number one priority of the Republican majority. And I've seen firsthand how cartels and smugglers are exploiting the disastrous border crisis created by the Biden administration. Under the Biden administration, we hit catastrophic numbers, nearly 3 million border crossings in 2024 alone, bringing over 11 million encounters from when Biden took office. That's more than the entire population of Minnesota and Louisiana combined. And now we've seen under President Trump's leadership, 95% decrease in border encounters in just a few weeks. It's amazing what strong and tough leadership actually does and what following the law does. And that's what the Republican majority is committed to doing. Now the Agent Raul Gonzalez Officer Safety Act, of which I'm a proud co-sponsor, being led by another fellow Arizonan, Congressman Juan Siscamani. Now it's personal for Arizona and for me. Now these high speed pursuits are not merely statistics. Criminal illegal aliens are putting our communities and law enforcement officers at risk every single day. And now with President Trump's designation of the cartels as a foreign terrorist organization on January 20th, we finally have the tools to treat these barbarians like the terrorists they are. We have to kill the cartels. And this bill does one simple thing. If you flee from Border Patrol, you do hard time in jail. No more catch and release, no more games with our immigration laws. And if you're here illegally and you flee, you're gone. No asylum, no benefits, no second chances. Seems pretty common sense to me and to the American people. Now that's exactly what the American people asked for in November when they voted overwhelmingly for Republicans. Now this bill passed with bipartisan votes in the last Congress as a chairwoman recognized. And there's no reason it shouldn't receive even more support this time. And it probably will. It probably will because the Democrats got shellacked on November 5th. And now they wanna stay relevant. So they're trying to act a little bit more moderate than they truly are. But we've seen under their direction leadership that they created this border crisis. And for too long, so many in the media tried to paint it as Republicans are being racist by calling it an invasion. We understand that it was an invasion. And that's exactly why President Trump, this Republican majority, is focused on fixing it very quickly. Now the American people are demanding action on the border crisis we inherited. And that is exactly what House Republicans are doing to fix it. Thank you. Thanks, Abe. $20 million for a Sesame Street show in Iraq. 1.5 million to promote LGBT advocacy in Jamaica. 2 million for sex changes and LGBT activism in Guatemala. 1.5 million to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion in Serbia's workplaces and business communities. The list of absurdities bankrolled by hardworking US taxpayers goes on and on. But no more. President Donald Trump is delivering on his promise to shake up the status quo in Washington by ensuring the federal government is accountable to the American people who actually fund it. Through DOJ, millions of wasted and mismanaged taxpayer dollars have already been exposed. And countless inefficient and unnecessary government positions have been identified. And they're only just beginning. What they've uncovered so far is shocking. And this is, again, only the beginning. As DOJ continues to root out waste, fraud, and abuse within our federal government, our House Republican majority stands ready to ensure that our laws follow through on the mandate given to us in November to do the same. Meanwhile, Democrats in Congress are threatening to shut down the government over policies they simply do not like. One senator even claimed the accounting of the federal government's spending abroad is a constitutional crisis. This is delusional. The Democrat Party's tantrums are exactly why they hold no majority in Congress and their candidate is not in the White House. DOJ is rightly pulling back the curtains that have been closed for years. And the outrage we are seeing across the aisle is baffling but not surprising, given their record of mismanagement of taxpayer dollars. Americans see DOJ for what it is, a promise made and a promise kept. That's why President Trump's approval rating during his first three weeks in office have surpassed all expectations. The golden age of America is here, and we're just getting started. With that, our leader, Steve Scalise. STEVE SCALISE, President of the United States Thank you, Whip. We are just getting started. And it's a new day, and you're already seeing the benefits of President Trump's aggressive approach towards turning Washington back to the people, standing up for the people of this country that have been beaten down, that have been struggling under the failed policies of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris for the last four years. And it's been at a rapid pace. If you compare Donald Trump's first month in office in 2017 to what you're seeing today, you're watching a much more focused and aggressive president who came to Washington to finally stand up and fight for those families who have been struggling. And he's taking the lessons from his first term and delivering bigger results, faster results for the American people. If you look at some of the things we're working on right now, obviously the budget is something you may ask the speaker about. I don't know, maybe one or two questions. But it's something we've been spending a lot of time on because it is the way that we're going to be delivering some of the biggest commitments that were made during the election. Some of the biggest things that President Trump wants to accomplish are included in our reconciliation plan. If you think about it, there are a lot of bills out there, a lot of ideas out there. There's only one plan that delivers all of the commitments and priorities that President Trump has, and that's the House plan. If you think about what we're trying to do with first getting a budget, then getting a reconciliation bill, it's going to be to deliver for border security, making sure that we can build the wall, making sure that we give our Border Patrol agents the tools they need, night vision goggles, other technology like drones, so that they can more safely and effectively protect and secure America's border from the massive flow of illegals that we saw the last four years. We're going to produce more American energy, yes, in the Gulf of America, in ANWR, and every point in between. We're going to deliver in that big, beautiful bill, more American energy that was shut off by the Biden administration, who coddled foreign countries, made us more dependent on foreign energy. We're going to reverse that and allow our country to deliver again, not just creating more jobs, not just lowering costs for families at the pump and at the grocery store, which it will do, but allowing us to be energy independent again and help our allies around the world again. Exporting LNG, for example, when Biden said no to that, we're going to be saying yes, which again lowers costs here at home. And then we're going to ensure that there are no Americans that see a tax increase. If Biden got his way, if Kamala Harris got her way, if the Democrats who are in the minority got their way, the American people would see a multi-trillion dollar tax increase. House Republicans are not going to let that happen. That's part of our bill, is to continue the tax cuts from 2017, keeping those rates stable, adding on the priorities that President Trump talked about in the campaign, like no tax on tips, and giving real certainty to our economy to create more jobs, to bring more investment into America. That's what we're fighting to do, and we're going to deliver. The budget chairman indicated they may go as early as Thursday of this week in budget committee to start this process, but we're not going to stop working on this until it gets done. Failure is not an option. We're also going to continue bringing bills to the floor. And I think you heard Lisa McClain talk in detail about the bills we're bringing. Look, when you think about this idea of illegals fleeing law enforcement and the harm it's caused, deaths it's caused to Border Patrol agents and others, finally bringing a bill to make that a deportable offense, that's a bill that got a lot of bipartisan votes last year when we brought it, but Chuck Schumer said he wasn't going to even allow it to come up for a vote last year. Well, again, it's a new day in the Senate, and Senator Thune and his majority are going to bring that bill to the floor when we send it over to him, and that will have a really good chance of getting to President Trump's desk, like the Lake and Riley Act, where the president will be able to sign more legislation just in his first few weeks in office to deliver on those promises of securing America's border. The man who's been leading our efforts and working closely with President Trump to get this agenda moved forward is our speaker, Mike Johnson. Thanks so much, Mr. Leader, and to this leadership team, to Abe Hamadeh, one of the most talented new members of Congress, glad you're participating this morning. It is a busy morning here and a great time in America. We were delighted to host President Trump in the Superdome on Sunday, first time a sitting president has attended a Super Bowl. As you saw, when they put his image up on the jumbotron, the place went crazy. There was a lot of excitement and enthusiasm about President Trump and about, I would say, the House Republicans in Congress. We were cheered on Bourbon Street. There's something happening out there because people feel this great sense of excitement, this anticipation, this energy, because President Trump is delivering on his promises. He's delivering on the agenda, and they know that we are as well. A lot of the things that are being done through the executive branch are going to be codified in the House, and we're working methodically to make sure all that is possible. There was a new CBS poll that came out that said seven in 10 Americans believe President Trump is doing what he said he would do. That's promises made, promises kept. You're going to see that continuing theme and the theme of restoring common sense around here. As I said last week, the Democratic Party is in a completely different place right now. There's no identified leader of the party. They don't have a clear vision. They seem rudderless. In hopes of finding themselves, they've latched onto this new shiny object called the rule of law. We'd like to welcome them to the concept. It would be admirable if they hadn't spent the last four years with their heads buried in the sand while Biden literally trampled over the rule of law with no objection. In fact, many Democrats cheered that lawlessness, like when the Biden administration unconstitutionally forced the middle class to pay the student loans of doctors and lawyers, when they illegally mandated that private companies implement vaccine requirements, when they radically rewrote Title IX to undermine women's rights. Those things were actually illegal, and the Democratic Party cheered it. They didn't oppose it at all. President Trump, by contrast, is taking legitimate executive action to root out waste, fraud, and abuse in all these federal programs. That's what the American people demand and deserve. That's what they voted for. They voted for a real analysis and a real change, transformational kind of change in the way the federal government works. The only people who take issue with it are these same congressional Democrats who never before had any issue with unelected staff or even bureaucrats running the White House for the last four years. That's not what's happening here. The president has empowered his new cabinet secretaries and the DOJ effort and all of these branches, divisions in the executive branch of government, to go and find where the abuses have taken place. Every time something new is unearthed and uncovered and we share it with the people, they applaud that this has been discovered, and they want us to keep going. That's what's going to happen. You heard a lot about what's happening on the floor this week. I just want to highlight one more thing. The House is going to vote on the Midnight Rules Relief Act. You've heard about this. This legislation will amend the Congressional Review Act to allow Congress to overturn multiple regulations issued in the final months of a presidential administration with just one single vote. That's important for efficiency purposes and because of the facts that we're dealing with right now. In the waning months of the Biden administration, over 1,400 unnecessary, harmful, last-minute rules were imposed. Those are things that hurt small business owners and hardworking Americans and families. This is the type of legislation that we'll move this week that receives little fanfare outside these halls, but it has the real potential to make a substantial impact on the lives of everyday Americans. You heard a lot about, I won't repeat it, but the Agent Raul Gonzalez Officer Safety Act is critically important. Again, just one more example of how we are delivering on the promises, taking care of the border, making American communities safe again. We're going to be unleashing American energy dominance again and restoring our stature on the world stage, peace through strength, and all the things that make America strong and secure. I'm delighted we have a Commander-in-Chief who's leading that charge. It is a great delight to see him applaud it all around the country, everywhere he goes, including at the Super Bowl. I'll take a few questions this morning. Jeff, Jeff, go ahead. Mr. Speaker, I have a statement that will be engaged in any meeting, whether it's with me, you, or Bill O'Reilly. You can go to the bank, a liar, and a total shill. Donald Trump and Elon Musk, I've covered you for more than a decade, dating back to your time in the Louisiana legislature. I've never heard anybody say anything like that about you, ever. I wondered if you had a reaction. Bless his heart. Look, the Democrats are flailing, okay? I get it. They've engaged in some pretty crazy rhetoric over the last couple of weeks. We're going to shut down the city. We're at war. We're going to fight them in the streets. You've all seen that covered. It's because they're kind of in panic mode in the party over there. As I noted, they don't really have a vision or a strategy. They don't really have a leader. Their platform has been openly repudiated by the American people and the election outcome. They're really in a tough spot. What people tend to do in politics in that way is they lash out at leaders on the other side. I don't take it personally. I don't think he can back up a single thing he said. What we're doing is delivering on the mandate that the American people gave us. Remember, President Trump got 77 million popular votes and the House Republicans got 74.8 million. It's the highest popular vote total that we've ever received in the House Republicans in this chamber. We are executing on that mandate. I'll tell you what, what we're doing is widely applauded by the American people because they see the results. They see the restoration of common sense. They see that this thing is moving in the right direction. There's a real energy and hope and anticipation out there. It was not just people from Pennsylvania and Kansas that were at the Super Bowl in Missouri or any other state that was there. People from all over the country were there, and Louisianians. There's a great microcosm of the country just out in the streets in New Orleans, just enjoying it. Everywhere, everywhere, people are saying that they're really excited about what they see happening in Washington. That doesn't happen very often around here. You all know. We're a part of that. We're excited about it. When you're making big change, it ruffles some feathers, but this is positive change. It's good change for the country. We're excited to be a part of it. The reconciliation process is where you're going to see the lion's share of that. It is by design. Everybody knows how it works. The reconciliation process is effectively a partisan mechanism. It shouldn't be. What we're going to be doing are things that are great for every American. We would hope that some Democrats come along with us on it. I hope they will. The reconciliation package is going to have most of those provisions. Along the way, throughout the year, you'll see this flurry of executive activity and all the executive orders. A lot of it really does need to be codified so that it's more permanent. It can't change every time you have a new election. We're working through that list to try to see how much of it we can do. You'll see that as a steady stream throughout the year. A lot put in reconciliation, perhaps some of it in the approach process. We'll see how that develops, but then you'll see it as a steady drip throughout the year. The branches have to respect our constitutional order, but there's a lot of game yet to be played. Those will be appealed. We've got to go through the whole process. We'll get to the final analysis. In the interim, I will say I agree wholeheartedly with Vice President J.D. Vance, my friend, because he's right. What they're doing in the executive branch, I've been asked so many times, aren't you uncomfortable with this? No, I'm not. When Congress, for example, appropriates dollars for the executive branch to use, we build in, not only in the spirit of the law, but in the letter of law, a broad amount of discretion for how that is used. There is a presupposition in America that the Commander-in-Chief is going to be a good steward of taxpayer dollars. The President of the United States is going to command those within his branch of government to do the right thing by the people, to be accountable, to not fund drag shows in Middle Eastern countries or South America, to not waste our taxpayer dollars. That's what has been uncovered. That's why we and the people are applauding what's happening right now in the new administration, because they've taken that seriously. They're doing it. The forensic audits, effectively, that Doge and Elon Musk are leading. I met with Elon yesterday about this to get an update. To me, it's very exciting what they're able to do, because what Elon and the Doge effort is doing right now is what Congress has been unable to do in recent years, because the agencies have hidden some of this from us. There's a lot of oversight activity that goes on around here all the time, you all know, but when duly elected representatives of the people request information to find all of these abuses and it's not turned over to us, what it takes is an actual audit of the systems and the files themselves that are often hidden from Congress. That's what you're seeing right now, and that's why this is so exciting. They're uncovering things that we have known intuitively have been there, but we couldn't prove it. Now the proof is being provided, and no one can argue the counter to that, so stay tuned. There's a lot more to come, and I think the courts should take a step back and allow these processes to play out. What we're doing is good and right for the American people. What Doge is doing is making sure that your taxpayer dollars, all of us, are spent in the way that they're intended to be spent, and that they're in America's interest, and they're financially responsible with the precious taxpayers' money. We have a $36 trillion federal debt, and we have got to get a hold of these things. You're going to see it reflected in the reconciliation package that comes forward. You're going to see it reflected in appropriations as we go forward, and you're going to see it in these efforts to cut the waste, fraud, and abuse, and we think the final number on that is going to be substantial and a game changer in Washington for the country. We'll have a lot more questions and answers, I know, as the week goes forward, but I'll just tell you... But is there a guarantee that under any proposal, Medicaid would not be on the chopping block? What we're talking about is finding the... It's non-benefit-related reforms to the program, right? Medicaid is infamous for fraud, waste, and abuse. I mean, by some estimates, large percentages of the dollars that are allocated there are wasted and stolen, and so we do right to go into those programs and find that, and show the people what's happened, and make sure it doesn't happen again. And if you eliminate fraud, waste, and abuse in Medicaid, you've got a huge amount of money that you can spend on real priorities for the country. And if you make sure that people who are able-bodied workers, men under the age of 40, for example, who have rolled onto Medicaid and gotten onto the expansion and need to be working, if you add work requirements into Medicaid, it makes sense to people. It's common sense. Little things like that can make a big difference, not only in the budgeting process, but in the morale of the people. Work is good for you. You find dignity in work, and the people that are not doing that, we're going to try to get their attention. So, everyone needs to take a deep sigh of relief and understand that we're not going to harm any Americans with this. What we're doing is the right thing by the people, and we're excited to be a part of that. That's what you're going to see roll out. And on the budget, on the budget, and then, well, yes, a markup is going to be scheduled for Thursday. That's the intention. The budget chairman, Arrington, just spoke to conference and said that that will be rolling out the details of that probably by tonight. If they notice a markup, they can do it by Thursday, and we are right on the schedule that we need to be on. So, stay tuned for more developments. Thank you.