Speaker Johnson Joins Kudlow on Fox Business

Joining me now to talk about peace and growth and prosperity is House Speaker Mike Johnson. Mr. Speaker, thank you for doing this. I know you're very, very, very busy, but we appreciate it. And I just think peace and prosperity, there's two big themes tonight. I want him to sell the heck out of it. I want him to throw some numbers in. He promised me he would when I sat down with him a couple weeks ago, but I think he has much to be proud of, and I think the country has much to be proud of, Mr. Speaker. As usual, Professor Kudlow, you summarize it all so well. I can't hardly improve upon what you've said. I had the same conversation with the president most recently about two hours ago, and I said, go big and sell what we've done. And he will. There's a lot to say. As you said, promises made, promises kept. When we are sitting in a country right now where inflation and gas prices and crime are going down and paychecks and tax refunds are going up, you have a secure border again. You have a restoration of peace through strength. We're respected around the world again, solving wars along the way. We've got American energy dominance on the way. All these things are exactly what we told the people we'd do in 2024, and that's what we did after just one year of President Trump's second administration, second term. So lots more to do, much more to go. He's going to communicate that tonight, and it's going to be a great evening for the State of the Union. Speaker, do you have any expectations of any new policies? I'm sure he'll mention Iran. I don't know whether he's going to break any news on Iran. I don't think he's going to. I mean, I think when I spoke to him about domestic policy, he said, no more reconciliation bills. Let's just keep executing the one big, beautiful bill, which I might add, you and I were among the stalwarts who kept that title together. But anyway, there might be some breakthroughs on foreign policy. What do you think about that possibility? Well, we'll see how far he goes in terms of communicating all that tonight. I just literally left a gang of eight briefing, national security briefing regarding Iran to come and be with you. And I can tell you we're in good position on all of that. That's about all I can say. But the president watches it very closely. I think a lot of the emphasis tonight will be on domestic policy and on the economy and on our continuing quest to bring down the cost of living and expand opportunity and liberty and security for the American people. That's what we've done. That's what the president is laser focused upon doing. So you'll hear more about making life more affordable. And I think that's a big thing we can do together. Now, you're right, Larry, you and I were big advocates of the one big, beautiful bill, the working families tax cut. We did that through reconciliation. I'm not yet ready to concede that we're not going to have a second reconciliation bill. We've been working on that. And after I heard the president say that to you, I called him and I went on Maria Bartiromo show and said that I'm still bullish on it. So let's not give up hope yet. I think there are some things we could squeeze into that package that we could do it with only Republican votes. Look, I don't think the Democrats are in any mood to give the president any more wins because he's had so many. And so it may be that we have to do a lot of this on our own. I hope that's not true, but we'll be prepared either way. Well, you've been a magician and getting these majorities in the House. I mean, literally a magician. Do you think is there reconciliation that might settle the DHS controversy? Is it reconciliation that might have more spending and even more tax cuts? Well, I think a lot of it's on the table with regard to the Department of Homeland Security. It is true that we are in a partial shutdown right now, and the Democrats have chosen now for the third time in 100 days to close the government. And this time, Larry, they chose Homeland Security. It is the agency that literally, by its name, indicates it keeps Americans safe. And it's madness. I mean, they're fooling around with TSA and the Coast Guard and the Secret Service in these dangerous times and FEMA when we're dealing with winter storms all over the East Coast. So it makes no sense. I hope that as soon as the State of the Union is over, that the Democrats in the Senate will come to their senses and negotiate in good faith. I don't think they've done that thus far. We've got to get to a resolution on that to get that 12th Appropriations Bill done and then have the government fully funded, and I certainly hope we can do that. You got through the revised Save America Act. Citizenship is required to vote. Voter ID is required to vote. What are you hearing on the Senate side, Mr. Speaker? Well, you know, we passed a version of that bill three times in the House, and we had the proof of citizenship to register to vote in the Save Act. And we changed it, as you noted, to the Save Act because now we've added the component of voter ID necessary to vote. Now, look, that is almost a 90-10 issue across the country, Larry. It's common sense. 70 percent of Democrats tell the pollsters that they agree with that basic, simple requirement for election security. So we passed it through the House. We sent it over to the Senate. I know that Leader Thune and Senate Republicans are committed to that, and they're working very hard to find 60 votes. Will we get a handful of Senate Democrats to acknowledge that they should follow the will of the American people and do the right thing to help secure our elections? I guess we'll find out soon. But we certainly hope we can get it at the President's desk. So coming back to the bread-and-butter economy stuff, I mean, you know, between refunds and actual tax cuts in one big, beautiful bill, middle-class folks, middle-class working folks, middle-class families at the kitchen table, they're going to get a bonus over $5,000 this year. I mean, that's a heck of a thing, refunds and actual tax cuts. Now, businesses and small businesses got a big bonus because of 100 percent depreciation. So you can write off everything, including new factories, which we all love. But I think individuals, I don't think people appreciate the fact that there's $5,000. You talk about affordability, that is going to do more to help affordability than anything else out there. Yeah, and for the average household across the country, it's about $10,000 more in take-home pay that you get to keep that Uncle Sam doesn't take from you. That's because of Republican policies. We did exactly what we said we were going to do. Larry, to your point, I think more and more people are going to realize that. They're going to feel the effect and the benefit of that as we go further into 2026. As Scott Besson said so well a couple weeks ago, he summarized it. He said, listen, 2025 was just setting the table, and 2026 will be the feast and the banquet in the economy. And I think we can expect dramatic growth, continued growth and expansion, more jobs, higher wages. I think all those things will happen because we have put the conditions in place to make it possible. We wrote the Working Families Tax Cut, the big beautiful bill, to gear it for lower and middle class earners. And they are going to feel the effects of that. It's not just no tax on dips, no tax on overtime. It's all of it. All the combined effects of the pro-growth policies we infused in the legislation are now coming to fruition. So we expect great things ahead. And as we go into the midterm election, I think people are going to be in a very good mood about the economy. Do you think anything's going to change on trade? I mean, so the Supreme Court ruled against Mr. Trump on the IEPA. I frankly, personally wish they hadn't. You're the constitutional lawyer. I'm certainly not. But he has other tools in his toolkit with 301s and 232s and so forth, I think, to stay with his trade policy. And to me, we need that trade policy, not only for reciprocity in a level playing field and improving our economy, but also for the conduct of foreign policy. So what are you thinking after the Supreme Court decision, sir? Well, I was disappointed in the outcome. Certainly, it is inarguable that the president has used the tariff and that tool in the toolbox, so to speak, to affect America's trade policy. And it's had dramatically positive results. I mean, he has reset our trade imbalance. He has gotten us into a much better reciprocal trade agreement with many of these countries. And he's used it well, brought billions and billions of dollars into the country that were not there otherwise. So it was a blow to him because it takes some of his flexibility away. But to your point, there are other authorities in the statutes that he's already using to continue his strategy. So we'll see how it all shakes out. We are going to work with the White House very closely in the coming weeks to sort through all of this and see how it changes things. But I do think there is some degree of certainty now that is coming into the economy and to decision makers in the economy, to the captains of industry all across the economy on what this will mean going forward. There'll be a range, I think, of tariffs that they can now adapt to and plan accordingly. And I think overall, that probably has a positive effect. So we'll see. There's a lot of questions that remain yet over the Supreme Court opinion. But we are going to move forward. We adapt and that's what we do. The decision may cause more trouble than frankly it was worth putting their nose into it. But are you expecting any amendments or changes to the trade laws from the House? Well, we'll see. I mean, there's a lot of discussion yet to be had. I mean, the difficult thing is finding consensus around some of that. So I've told the president, frankly, that I think codifying some of the tariff would be a difficult thing at this moment. As you know, Larry, I've got the smallest margin imaginable in U.S. history. It's a one-vote, razor-thin margin among the House Republican Conference. So to do something that's a partisan priority, which I think this would be, it'd be a huge lift. Not saying anything's impossible, Larry, because nothing's impossible around here as we demonstrate all the time. But we've got to be sober-minded about it going forward. And we'll see. We're going to have lots of fruitful discussion about that in the weeks ahead. Well, as I said before, Mr. Speaker, you're a magician when it comes to getting things passed on the House among the Republicans. Is there a Republican cavalry on the way for the midterm elections? There is. I'm very bullish about the midterms. I mean, I could give you a very boring 90-minute slideshow with all the data and the reasoning behind this, OK? I'm available. I'm available, sir. I know. You'd probably get into it like I do. But listen, there's a lot of great reasons. We have an extraordinary record to run on, as we've been talking about tonight. We have extraordinary candidates, not just the incumbents in the field, but the candidates we've recruited to flip some of the blue seats to red. We have a slight fundraising advantage at the moment, Republicans over Democrats, which hasn't happened in about 10 years. And I think public opinion is on our side. They see and will continue to see the results of good policy, the restoration of common sense, the end of the woke ideology and all of that nonsense that got us off track during the Biden years. And I think they're going to vote for more of this. We're the group that will provide it as the Democrats slide further and further to the radical left. The insurgent Marxist left is trying to take over the Democrat Party. So we have a very stark contrast to put out there for the American people to decide upon. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mike Johnson, we appreciate it very much, sir. You got it. God bless.