HUNT VALLEY, Md. (TNND) — House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said Monday he told House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., to ignore President Donald Trump’s recent social media posts about the Democrat.
I told my friend Hakeem, who is my friend, I said, man, don’t pay attention to it, don’t respond to it because it makes it worse,” Speaker Johnson said during an MSNBC interview. “I learned that the hard way a long time ago.”
Leader Jeffries called one of Trump’s posts about him and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., racist last week. The president shared an artificial intelligence video on Truth Social on Monday showing Leader Jeffries, with a handlebar mustache and sombrero, standing next to Leader Schumer, who talks about their alleged shutdown negotiations as mariachi music plays.
“Mr. President, the next time you have something to say about me, don’t cop out through a racist and fake AI video,” the House Democrat said during a Tuesday press conference. “When I’m back in the Oval Office, say it to my face.”
The video Trump posted depicts Leader Schumer explaining that Democrats could temporarily win the votes of people living illegally in the country by giving them free healthcare, a provision the president and some Republicans claim the Democrats have asked for in shutdown negotiations. (Leader Schumer denies his party requested it.)
“If we give all these illegal aliens free healthcare, we might be able to get ’em on our side so they can vote for us. They can’t even speak English, so they won’t realize we’re just a bunch of woke pieces of sh*t, you know?” the video depicts Leader Schumer saying. “At least for a while, until they learn English and they realize they hate us too.”
Leader Jeffries also spoke about the post during an appearance on MSNBC, calling it disgusting and bigoted. The president later shared an edited clip of his comments, portraying the Democrat in a mustache and sombrero again as four Trumps play mariachi behind him.
Leaders Jeffries and Schumer said in a joint statement on Wednesday that Trump had become “erratic” and “unhinged.”
“Instead of negotiating a bipartisan agreement in good faith, he is obsessively posting crazed deepfake videos. The country is in desperate need of an intervention to get out of another Trump shutdown,” the Democrats said.
Speaker Johnson added in his interview that the “key” for everybody on “both sides” is to not play into the trolling.
“Just do your job, and we’ll get through and we’ll get to policy negotiating,” he said.
