Speaker Johnson Joins Fox News’ Special Report with Bret Baier from Capitol Hill

WASHINGTON - Tonight, Speaker Johnson sat for a wide-ranging interview with Bret Baier on Fox News' Special Report to discuss the budget reconciliation process, the Department of Government Efficiency, government funding, and the upcoming Speakership election in January.

Click here to watch the full interview

On the budget reconciliation process:

Look, everyone is absolutely determined to get the budget done very quickly right out of the gates. We're going to do that early January and that will set the table for the reconciliation process. And the reason that's so important, of course, for folks back home, remember the only way around the 60-vote threshold in the Senate, to go with the bare majority, is the reconciliation process. You are reconciling the budget. So, 51 votes in the Senate is the magic to do the real policy change that we want.

We think we can squeeze a lot into that limited process. There probably will be at least two reconciliation packages. So, the determination right now is where does the tax piece fit in? Do we do that first out of the gates, or do you wait a couple months to get all that done? Because it can be very complicated.

It's no surprise that border is the top of everyone's priority list because it's the top of the list for the American people. We do that, we do energy policy, we ensure that we don't have the largest tax increase in US history, which is what would happen at the end of next year if we don't extend those tax cuts. And a lot of other things that we want to do. In the meantime, we'll be dismantling the deep state. And that's what the DOGE effort is all about.

On the Department of Government Efficiency:

I think it's a once in a lifetime opportunity to do really big, transformational things. I brought them to the Hill last week and met with a small group of chairs of the committees of jurisdiction, people who are actually kind of the engineers of the budget and kind of the infrastructure of government and how it works. Great productive discussion and interaction.

But Congress certainly has a role to play in all of that and how it interacts with the budget and all that together. There's a lot of meticulous planning that goes into executing on this, and I'm very confident we'll be able to do that. Elon and Vivek are pretty smart guys. And they know a lot about running efficient and productive companies. And this is a large one, the federal government.

On government funding:

In principle, we don't like continuing resolutions, but in this case, as a Republican, as a conservative, it does make the most sense, and that's why all the conservative groups are in favor of that idea. Because it allows us to make more of these key decisions in the new year, when we have the new Congress, new President, new Senate and House.

On the Speakership election:

Look, we have a unified conference. I've talked with every single individual at great length and all of us collectively are ready to take - using our football metaphor - to take this proverbial football and run it right back up the field. And to do that, you've got to have cohesion on your team and you've got to have all that predetermined, and it is. So I think we'll have a smooth transition and a smooth election as speaker. Because we don't have any time to waste.

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