House Speaker Mike Johnson on March 4, 2025 (Joshua Sukoff/Shutterstock.com)
House Republican Speaker Mike Johnson paid tribute to President Donald Trump on Tuesday, portraying him less as an elected leader and more as a divinely chosen figure. He declared that Trump had been “miraculously” spared from an assassination attempt during the 2024 campaign, so that he could go on to enact his “America First” agenda by signing into law the GOP budget—his so-called One Big Beautiful Bill, a sweeping package of tax cuts and government spending.
Speaker Johnson, widely viewed as a Christian nationalist, told reporters (video below) that during last year’s assassination attempt that left one bystander dead, “God miraculously spared the president’s life.”
“I think it’s undeniable, and he did it for an obvious purpose. And his presidency and his life are the fruits of divine providence,” declared Johnson. “He points that out, obviously, now all the time, and he’s right to do so.”
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“As President Trump has lived since with the acknowledgment, everyday since, he has acknowledged that each new day isn’t guaranteed to us,” Johnson claimed. “It isn’t to any of us, and that’s why we’re not wasting any time. That’s why he remains so strong and resilient. It’s why we have such a sense of urgency. President Trump took a bullet to his head. He got up shortly thereafter. He pleaded with the crowd to fight, and then he went on to win a historic election, less than four months later. America’s changed because he survived that day.”
Johnson’s rhetoric contains several hallmarks of fascistic rhetoric, including deification of a leader and positioning him as a figure chosen by God to do God’s work.
Critics responded to Johnson’s remarks.
“How far is it from divine providence to divine right and absolutism?” asked journalist and author Nikolaus von Twickel.
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“This is the Speaker of the House publicly and confidently espousing Christian Nationalist talking points and characterizing a profoundly, unrepentantly sinful man as a quasi-deity,” noted award-winning author Jennifer Erin Valent. “Every true believer needs to call this out for the blatant heresy that it is.”
Utah Democratic state Senator Nate Blouin declared, “this is insane rhetoric and it’s disturbing to see people of faith embrace it.”
“This nation was formed by patriots fleeing this kind [of] purple Dominionist cant,” television writer and playwright Hal Corley wrote. “Presidents are not anointed like divine right royalty and such doctrinaire rhetoric should be condemned.”
Watch the video below or at this link.