Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Tuesday condemned the current Speaker for not committing to certify the 2024 election results.
A reporter asked Johnson, a Republican, in the morning whether he would certify the results if Democrat Kamala Harris defeats Republican Donald Trump.
“Of course. If we have a free, fair, and safe election, we’re gonna follow the Constitution,” Johnson responded.
“Why should there be a caveat? Why don't we just all agree? Whoever wins, we are for the peaceful transfer of power,” Pelosi said in an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper in the afternoon. “He's trying again to wed himself to this fake conspiracy theory about the election.”
Johnson this year has already pushed Trump's conspiracy theories to question the veracity of the upcoming election, including by pushing the lie that millions of undocumented immigrants are voting in elections.
Political experts have raised concerns about the possibility that Johnson, should he remain in power after the House elections this November, could throw up roadblocks to the certification should the Republican nominee lose the election. Johnson was a key Trump ally in attempting to overturn his 2020 defeat, filing an amicus briefing in a lawsuit that sought to overturn the results. The United States Supreme Court ended up tossing out the lawsuit, which sought to invalidate Biden’s wins in four swing states — Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin — and give the presidency to Trump.
Johnson would face a tough road to change the actual results in January since Harris, as the current vice president, would preside over the joint House and Senate session in a ceremonial role and call votes if there are enough objections to do so. But critics fear the potential for chaos if Johnson does not certify the results or delays them — a ceremonial and procedural process until Trump and his allies tried to exploit it in 2020 to keep him in power.
Pelosi argued Johnson’s comments in the morning highlight the need for House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, a Democrat, to become Speaker, should Democrats win control of the House on Election Day.
“We organize to make sure that Hakeem Jeffries has that gavel on January 6. It's very essential, not only for the issues that we care about," Pelosi said. “But our democracy is very important … as we work to elect a Democratic president and vice president, to elect a Democratic Congress, to make sure that we can't have this personal opinion when it's an absolute fact of numbers.”
