Not even two hours after Charlie Kirk was fatally shot in Utah, Speaker Mike Johnson sought to hold a moment of silence for the young conservative activist.
It lasted only a few seconds before the situation devolved into yelling and chaos, leaving Johnson banging his gavel as he tried to restore order in the House. Ever since, he’s been struggling to convince both sides of the chamber to keep partisan finger-pointing from spiraling out of control.
Over the past 24 hours, Johnson has been the most powerful elected Republican urging lawmakers and Americans generally to keep things from escalating both online and in person. The Louisianan’s approach is largely in keeping with the way previous speakers might have handled the traumatic situation, but it is out of step with a polarized political culture that has come to color most everything that happens on Capitol Hill.
“What I’m going to do is what I’ve always done,” Johnson told reporters later Thursday. “I’m always about turning down the temperature and encouraging members to walk in the dignity of their office and treat one another with dignity and respect. And I think it’s an important moment for leaders to say that.”
Johnson’s approach is informed in part by his role as nominal leader of the whole House, Republican and Democrat, and his responsibility for managing the security of its 435 members. On Thursday, he described a new burst of private concerns from lawmakers in both parties about their own safety, citing the skyrocketing tensions.
Just last week he noted an uptick in threats against members of Congress during an address to a meeting of G7 country legislative chiefs. On Thursday, Johnson indicated would expedite a review of enhanced funding for lawmakers’ security — a pilot program of money that’s set to expire at the end of the month. He also suggested to a small group of reporters that Republicans were considering boosting funding for member security in a government funding stopgap.
“People are scared to death in this building,” Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.) said Thursday. “I mean, not many of them will say it publicly, but they’re running to the speaker talking about security.”
But inside the Republican caucus, he is dealing with more than requests for bodyguards and security cameras. He is dealing with the rage of his own members, some of whom were quick to point the finger at their Democratic colleagues Wednesday.
Florida Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, during the chaos following the moment of silence, yelled and pointed across the aisle. “Y’all caused this,” she said, before hurling expletives at Democrats.
On Thursday, Rep. Derrick Van Orden (R-Wis.) warned on X that the “Gloves are Off,” adding, “We will not allow these people to take our country. They are 21st Century Brown Shirts.” Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.) said in his own X post that he’s “going to cancel with extreme prejudice these evil, sick animals who celebrated Charlie Kirk’s assassination.”
Johnson — who told reporters shortly after the shooting that Kirk was “a good friend” — is taking a different rhetorical tack. He chose to make an appearance on CNN Wednesday night, in addition to an interview on GOP-friendly Fox News, where he played down the floor outburst as “a reflection of the emotion of the moment” and urged his members and others to take the temperature down.
While Johnson has cited threats to members of Congress generally, there is no doubt that he is himself a target. His immediate predecessor as speaker, Democrat Nancy Pelosi, was personally affected by politically motivated violence when her husband, Paul Pelosi, was brutally attacked in their San Francisco home in 2022.
Yet Johnson is also under intense pressure from some of his fellow Republicans to do more to protect the rank-and-file, with some infuriated that the speaker is insulated in his own security bubble and doesn’t have to deal with the same level of fear.
“We’ve got to protect people who run for public office or no one will, and that’s heavy on our hearts and minds as we also work through the trauma of what happened yesterday,” Johnson said Thursday.
Some Democrats think Johnson could still do more to call out the bipartisan nature of political violence as many in his party blame the left, as well as call out gun violence generally.
“I don’t think it’s appropriate to blame the speaker in a vacuum,” Rep. Mike Levin (D-Calif.) said Thursday. “But … I wish that the speaker had gone to [House Minority Leader Hakeem] Jeffries and said, ‘We had two tragic shootings today — one at the elementary school in Colorado and another with Charlie Kirk in Utah. Can we have a moment of silence for both of those things?”
Johnson will be tested inside his own party in the coming weeks by requests from his members that could further strain partisan tensions. Rep. Eric Burlison of Missouri is calling on him to allow Kirk to lie in state in the Capitol — an honor normally, but not always, reserved for elected officials. Luna is calling for a statue of Kirk to be placed in the Capitol, while other Republicans are pressing to award Kirk the congressional gold medal.
Johnson could find it difficult to keep those passions under wraps, but he appears to take his role as an institutional steward seriously.
Just moments after the outburst on the floor Wednesday night, Johnson swore in the House’s newest member, Democrat James Walkinshaw of Virginia. In his ceremonial office just off the House floor, Johnson posed for a customary photo with Walkinshaw. The speaker turned to the Democrat and said he hoped he had a long career on Capitol Hill. “We’ll try to get everybody under control here,” Johnson added.
Mia McCarthy and Nicholas Wu contributed to this report.
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