By Ben Meiselas
Following the massive Democratic wins last night across the nation, MAGA Mike Johnson finds himself once again spiraling. And the country is watching. The Republican Speaker of the House went on live television earlier to insist that his party’s stunning election losses were somehow proof that “people love the Republican Party.” He wasn’t convincing anyone, not even himself.
Johnson’s press conference was part humiliation ritual, part delusion. With Donald Trump looming over his shoulder, figuratively and politically, Johnson repeated talking points that would’ve embarrassed a less captive man. “We’re very bullish about the outcome of the midterms,” he said, just hours after Democrats swept major elections across the nation. “We have an extraordinary record to run on.”
That “record” is worth examining. Johnson’s House has been in session for just 11 of the past 102 days. His caucus shut down the government and left town while 42 million Americans lost food assistance, 17 million lost access to health care, and millions more faced skyrocketing costs. Yet he boasts about “cutting waste and regulation,” as though gutting Medicaid and slashing SNAP are achievements. I think the people told MAGA Mike exactly how they feel about his so-called record last night.
I brought Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries onto the show to respond, and he had a bit of a different take than MAGA Mike, to say the least. “House Republicans in their thin majority are going down in flames,” Jeffries said. “Mike Johnson is either lying to the American people, divorced from reality, or some combination of the two.”
Jeffries called the election results “a complete affirmation of the Democratic vision”—driving down the cost of living, fixing health care, and “pushing back aggressively against the corruption and extremism unleashed by Donald Trump and his cronies.”
And the corruption has been on full display. While Trump and his allies throw Gatsby-themed parties with champagne fountains and dancers in martini glasses, millions of Americans are struggling to afford groceries. “They literally ripped food out of the mouths of hungry children, seniors, and veterans,” Jeffries told me, pointing to $186 billion in cuts to nutritional assistance under the GOP’s watch. “They did all of that so they could reward their billionaire donors with massive tax breaks.”
What’s most disturbing, Jeffries added, is how the Republican majority is paralyzed by its own leadership. “These people are literally on a taxpayer-funded vacation,” he said, noting that Johnson has canceled votes for six straight weeks during a government shutdown. “The only rational explanation is that they don’t want to swear in Representative-elect Adelaida Grijalva, who would be the deciding vote to force the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files.”
Jeffries called the operation run by MAGA Mike and his cronies a “pedophile protection program” serving Trump’s interests and shielding powerful names from accountability. “They’re protecting people in those files at the direction of Donald Trump and the MAGA extremists in the White House,” he said.
Even as Trump’s team finds $40 billion for billionaire allies abroad, they claim there’s “no money” for feeding American children. Jeffries summed it up: “It’s a celebration of the lifestyles of the rich and shameless.”
Despite the dysfunction, Jeffries struck a hopeful note about where the country is headed. He and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer have invited Trump and Republican leaders to meet “any time, any place” to end the shutdown and negotiate a bipartisan spending plan. “We’re not going to support a partisan Republican bill that guts the health care of the American people,” Jeffries said. “We need to decisively address the health care crisis Republicans are visiting on this country.”
Before we wrapped, I asked Jeffries for his message to the millions of Americans watching this chaos unfold. His response captured both the urgency and optimism of the moment. “We’ve got to keep our foot on the gas pedal and finish the job,” he said. “We don’t work for Donald Trump, we don’t work for JD Vance, and we don’t work for their billionaire donors. We work for the American people.”
That’s the difference between the two parties right now: one works for the powerful, the other for the people. The blue wave that just swept the country was no fluke. It was a warning to every MAGA politician still pretending otherwise.
Watch my interview with Democratic House Leader Hakeem Jeffries above. And be sure to catch up on the MeidasTouch Podcast for more interviews and reports. It’s on all the various podcast platforms out there, like Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
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