How Mike Johnson Came Around on Ukraine

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) talks to Politico: “It was the intelligence, it was the Europe generals who are in charge of the freedom of the world and of course it was the developments as well, everything has escalated.”

“It may seem hard to square the congressman who, only in September, opposed $300 million in Ukraine aid with the one who put his career on the line to deliver $95 billion to the battered country. It’s easier to grasp when you realize Johnson grew up in the shadow of B-52s at Barksdale Air Force Base during the 1980s. He’s a Republican of the ‘Red Dawn’ generation. It only took a higher level of intelligence briefings, granted to congressional leaders, for him to pick up that old Cold War hymnal… Just days after his October election to the post, Johnson told Senate Republicans he supported Ukraine funding, so long as aid to Israel received a separate vote.”

Said one senior House GOP aide: “Amazing what some intel briefs will do.”