PROFILE IN COURAGE: House Speaker Mike Johnson deserves enormous credit for passing bipartisan bills providing urgent military aid for Israel, Ukraine, Taiwan

JERUSALEM, ISRAEL — Having lived and worked in Washington, D.C. for 24 years, I can tell you firsthand how toxic and dysfunctional Congress can be.

So often, America’s elected representatives look spineless as they refuse to do what is needed in a time of crisis. 

But every now and then, a rare leader steps up to do the right thing at the right time.

That’s exactly what happened this weekend.

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson showed what true and courageous leadership looks like.

How refreshing and encouraging. 

AN EVANGELICAL WHO IS PRO-ISRAEL AND PRO-FREEDOM

Johnson is a strong and principled conservative.

He is a devout Evangelical Christian.

He is also passionately pro-Israel.

And against all odds, he is trying hard to put his Christian and conservative values into practice to strengthen America and America’s allies in a time of great peril. 

This weekend, Johnson showed exceptional courage by putting all of his political capital on the line to pass the most important pieces of foreign policy legislation this year, despite serious threats by several House Republicans to oust him from office. 

Fortunately, Johnson ignored his bitter rivals and kept his eye on what truly matters.

MAKING AMERICA GREAT AGAIN

Making America Great Again does not mean cutting loose American allies.

Making America Great Again does not mean letting the world’s most wicked dictatorship devour our friends around the globe.

Making America Great Again means becoming stronger at home and advancing our values abroad. 

That’s why Speaker Johnson deserves to be praised for demonstrating how the Congress of the world’s only superpower should act in a time of war and terror. 

MAGA MEANS STANDING WITH OUR ALLIES

To that end, Johnson successfully brought to the floor of the House — and got passed — a package of bills that will provide a total of $95 billion in much-needed emergency wartime funding to key American allies who face existential threats from very dangerous enemies. 

The first and most important bill provides $26 billion in military and humanitarian aid for Israel in our raging war against the Iranian regime and its radical Islamist terror proxies in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen. 

That bill passed on Saturday with overwhelming bipartisan support on a vote of 366 in favor and only  58 against. 

Only 37 Democrats and 21 Republicans voted against aid for Israel.

Yet another bill provides $61 billion in military aid for Ukraine to buy more weapons and ammunition in their desperate war against Russian Czar Vladimir Putin and his Red Army.

Still another bill provides about $8 billion in funds to beef up Taiwan’s island defenses against the steadily rising threat of invasion by Communist China. 

The House also passed a bill threatening to ban the operation of TikTok, the Chinese-owned social media app, in the United States. 

THE SPEAKER NEEDS TO PUSH FORWARD A MAJOR BORDER SECURITY BILL, TOO

Personally, I wish that Speaker Johnson had also held a vote on urgently needed funding to dramatically strengthen U.S. border security to stop the dangerous invasion of 8 million-plus illegal migrants through Mexico.

Having chosen not to do that this weekend, Johnson must move quickly to bring a serious border security bill to the floor very soon. 

Still, America’s vital allies — Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan — absolutely need these funds.

Each faces enemies determined to annihilate them.

And by providing sufficient arms and ammunition for our allies to defend themselves, Congress will help reduce the risk that Americans will have to send her own sons and daughters to fight hot wars in the Middle East, Europe and Asia.

A PROFILE IN COURAGE

What makes Speaker Johnson a rare but refreshing profile in courage is that he did the right thing even knowing it might cost him his job.

Johnson pushed forward votes on critical foreign funding bills this weekend despite an active and ugly effort by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) to oust him from office.

MTG filed a “motion to vacate” last month, a procedure that would allow her to trigger a vote to bring down Johnson as Speaker, even though it’s by no means clear which Republican would have enough support to replace Johnson.

In recent days, Congressmen Thomas Massie (R-Kentucky) and Paul Gosar (R-Arizona) joined MTG in her threat to drive Johnson out of the Speaker’s Chair.

All three claim they are doing so as MAGA loyalists.

But they are wrong.

Mike Johnson isn’t perfect, but he’s the best man for the job right now. 

That’s my personal view, but I’m not alone.

Former U.S. President Donald J. Trump recently met with Speaker Johnson, publicly praised his leadership, and publicly backed his strategy to pass such aid bills for Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan, so long as some of the aid for Ukraine was made in the form of loans, not an outright gift.

To his credit, Johnson wisely agreed to Trump’s request.

This helped the Speaker unify most of the GOP House members behind him this weekend.

Good for him.

Johnson’s principled leadership and calm, collegial manner, also helped him persuade Democrats to vote in favor of the bills.

Isn’t this exactly the kind of bipartisanship America needs right now? 

Absolutely.

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NOTE FROM THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

To be clear, ALL ISRAEL NEWS is a non/profit and thus non-partisan news organization.

That’s why we don’t publish articles specifically endorsing legislation, much less asking our readers to call or write Members of Congress to urge them to vote for or against them.

That’s not what we do.

But it’s perfectly legal for us to publish news analysis columns like this one.

No, the bills that passed this weekend weren’t perfect.

But they were still important.

And I believe they will help good people in important countries defend themselves from sheer evil.

God bless America.