Liz Cheney turns up the heat on ‘coward’ House Speaker Mike Johnson

Former Republican conference chair Liz Cheney was on CNN’s State of the Union and tore into Speaker Mike Johnson over the Republican leader’s refusal to put supplemental funding for Ukraine and Israel up for a vote in the House.

It’s widely thought that, with support from many centre-left Democrats and some progressives, that the legislation passed with bipartisan support last week in the Senate would pass the lower chamber. But Speaker Mike Johnson has refused to bring the legislation to the floor, citing the demand from right-wing members of his caucus for border security to be addressed before the House passes further funding for other national security priorities.

That position has infuriated Republicans in the Senate, especially since the same faction of the House GOP is responsible for walking away from a bipartisan deal reached on border security by Senate negotiators.

Ms Cheney implored Mr Johnson to find his “conscience” and bring the legislation up for a vote as Ukraine’s military situation begins to look increasingly desperate. The White House this week directly blamed Congress’s inaction for the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from a city which they had been defending from a Russian advance for months.

Addressing CNN’s Jake Tapper on Sunday, she said: “One thing that’s really important, Jake, for the viewers to recognise and understand is, one man, one man has the power to get that done. And that’s Mike Johnson.”

“Mike Johnson ought to search deep in his conscience, understanding exactly what’s happening, the slaughter that’s happening,” she said. “History will look back on this moment, and ask: What did Mike Johnson do?”

His current resistance to bringing the legislation up for a vote, Ms Cheney continued,