Why a 2019 Mike Johnson speech raises ethics concerns

On October 4, 2019 — four years before he became House speaker — Rep. Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) gave the keynote speech at the Council for National Policy's conference in New Orleans. Johnson, according to the Daily Beast's Roger Sollenberger, "never reported" his visit to the Crescent City for that event.

In a report published on November 13, Sollenberger explains, "He never filed a gift travel report, and he didn't list the travel on his annual personal financial disclosure that year either. That leaves a few options: he paid for the trip out of pocket, the trip somehow didn't trigger the same reporting requirements that it did for his colleagues, or Johnson simply failed to disclose a gift from the conservative organization."

The Beast discussed the possible ethics concerns of Johnson's 2019 trip with Brendan Fischer, deputy executive director of the watchdog group Documented.

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Fischer told the Beast, "The most reasonable inference is that the very well-heeled CNP covered Johnson's expenses when he addressed the group's meeting in 2019, but the new speaker failed to report those gifts…. What (would make) it an ethics violation is if the payments aren't reported."

Sollenberger notes that when Johnson (who lives in Shreveport, Louisiana) gave his October 4, 2019 speech, he "told the audience that he had been in D.C. the prior night, at a dinner with yet another group of major conservative funders."

"This means Johnson most likely traveled to the CNP event from D.C.," Sollenberger explains. "While he may have returned home that night after the speech, it's a five-hour drive. There are no direct flights between New Orleans and Shreveport, and there is no passenger train service into Shreveport."

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