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It is officially the second longest shutdown in U.S. history as Democrats continue to gaslight the American people, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) said on the 34th day of the shutdown, taking time to separate fact from fiction. “We’re on day 34 of the Democrat shutdown,” Johnson started off, noting that this is now officially the second longest shutdown in U.S. history. On this day, Johnson used his press conference to walk through important facts, noting that there is a “staggering amount of gaslighting and false information that Democrats are engaging in right now.” “So we thought it would be useful to just this morning in a very brief and concise manner, separate fact from fiction. So I’m just going to go through four false claims that you have heard over and over and over and just explain once more what the simple truth is,” he said, starting off with the first fact: 1. It was not Republicans who closed the government. It was Democrats. “The obviously false claim of the Democrats is that Republicans have closed the government. I’ve heard them say this myself. You’ve all seen it in interviews. They’re blaming the shutdown on the Republicans, and it is patently absurd,” he said. Republicans voted to open the government over a dozen times. “Now, remember how this came about? Back in September 19 in the House, Republicans in the House voted to open the government. The clean continuing resolution to keep everything in operation. Every Democrat except one in the House voted to close the government, but we still passed it because we have the majority, and so we sent that bill over to the Senate,” he explained. “And 13 different occasions, 13 times, the Democrats have voted to close the government.” RELATED: The Democrats’ Shutdown Hypocrisy Is Shamefully Obvious “Republicans voted yes every time to open it,” he emphasized. “Republicans in the Senate and the House voted to keep the lights on to pay service members and our troops were in harm’s way, border patrol agents, TSA, air traffic controllers, all federal workers. They voted to ensure that women, infants and children nutrition programs continue and that SNAP benefits continue to go to the American families who are in need. By contrast, that the Democrats have voted no every single time,” he said. 2. Democrats outlined outrageous demands. Democrats rejected the clean CR while demanding billions upon billions in partisan spending. “In addition to their refusal to support the CR and reopen the government, the Democrats have had the audacity to also demand something new. They demanded $1.5 trillion – with a T – in new spending obligations in exchange for the simple funding resolution they filed on paper in the Senate record back in September, and it still sits there as their counter proposal,” he said, noting that the spending includes $200 billion of taxpayer funds to “restore free health benefits to illegal aliens.” “They want to spend billions in wasteful left-wing spending projects in foreign countries on things like LGBTQ+ awareness in the Horn of Africa [and] all sorts of things,” he pointed out. “I could give you a long list, and we’ve said it here before, they want to spend a half a billion dollars to prop up left-leaning news organizations. And shockingly, in that same proposal, as their ransom for reopening the government, they want to cut $50 billion from the rural hospital fund,” he added. 3. Democrats say they are fighting for health care. They are not. “You’ve heard this over and over and over. Let me say something very simply about this false claim. It is the Democrats who created Obamacare. It is the Democrats who did that without any Republican votes. It’s the Democrats who, by extension, have cost that the American taxpayers and people who have health insurance have made their costs skyrocket,” Johnson said. Simply put, he continued, it is Democrat policies that made this happen. “Instead of reforming it, the Democrats don’t reform Obamacare. They want to subsidize it. They want to spend more taxpayer dollars that, by the way, it goes mostly to insurance companies, which makes the cost rise further,” he noted. 4. Republicans are not responsible for the pain, despite Democrats asserting that. Calling that a “nonsensical statement, Johnson said the fact is “very clear, this is about math.” “Republicans need at least seven Democrats to join us. We only have 53 Republicans in the Senate. It takes 60 votes to reopen the government in the Senate. The House did its job. September 19, we’re waiting on the Senate to get this done. Leader John Thune and the Republicans have bent over backwards,” he said, reminding Americans that Democrats have “admitted openly they’re using the American people as leverage in this political game.”
