“Newly elected House Speaker Mike Johnson worked for a crisis pregnancy organization that used a mobile van to target ‘abortion-vulnerable women’ and persuade them not to terminate their pregnancies”
It’s been less than a week since Mike Johnson was voted Speaker of the House, but his long history of extremism is already getting aired out.
Johnson has an extensive record of anti-abortion extremism, homophobia, conspiracy theories, and ties with hate groups.
Read more below.
BUSINESS INSIDER: House Speaker Mike Johnson did work for a ‘crisis pregnancy’ center that used a van to find pregnant women
- Newly elected House Speaker Mike Johnson worked for a crisis pregnancy organization that used a mobile van to target “abortion-vulnerable women” and persuade them not to terminate their pregnancies, according to tax returns filed with the Internal Revenue Service.
- Johnson never disclosed his work for the organization on any of the eight financial disclosure forms he’s filed with the House Clerk since 2018. Members of Congress are required to disclose any position held at a nonprofit organization regardless of whether they were paid, according to the House of Representatives Committee on Ethics.
The 19th: House Speaker Mike Johnson has long opposed abortion and LGBTQ+ rights
- Johnson, while at [Alliance Defending Freedom], wrote opinion pieces for the newspaper in his hometown of Shreveport that called same-sex marriages “counterfeit legal arrangements” pushed by “radical homosexual advocacy groups” and opposed the inclusion of sexual orientation and gender identity in employment nondiscrimination policies.
- He introduced a bill that would restrict the discussion and programming related to gender identity, sexual orientation and gender dysphoria with children at federally funded institutions — a federal “Don’t Say Gay” bill, according to its critics.
HuffPost: New House Speaker Thinks Creationist Museum Is ‘Pointing People To The Truth’
- Johnson has close personal and professional ties to Ham, the founder and CEO of Answers in Genesis, the Christian group that’s behind Ark Encounter and the Creation Museum, both based in Kentucky. As an attorney, Johnson helped the gigantic ark attraction, which opened in 2016, secure millions in state tourism subsidies while also defending its right to make religious-based hiring decisions.
- Johnson wasn’t just the legal muscle for Answers in Genesis, which embraces the belief that the “account of origins presented in Genesis 1-11 is a simple but factual presentation of actual events.” He blogged on the organization’s website and spoke at a conference it hosted in 2022. Johnson and his wife, Kelly, a counselor who is also his podcast collaborator, are slated to appear at another Answers in Genesis conference in April 2024: “Overcoming the War on Women for the Glory of God.”
The Gambit: We listened to House Speaker Mike Johnson’s podcast so you don’t have to
- Before becoming Speaker this week, Johnson … is best known for authoring one of the first state level bills to undercut the Supreme Court’s 2015 decision affirming the right of same-sex people to marry. He did not, however, succeed in actually passing that bill.
- He’s also been reliably anti-choice during his career and has trafficked in false abortion propaganda for years, like in this 2020 video in which he claims doctors are sending abortion-inducing syringes to people in the mail.
Published: Oct 27, 2023 | Last Modified: Nov 1, 2023