Johnson Intends to Stay On as House GOP Leader If Republicans Lose Midterm Elections

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said Monday that he wants to remain the Republican House leader if the GOP loses the midterm elections next month.

Speaking to CBS News, Johnson said that a Republican loss in the House is an “unlikely scenario,” but said he would expect Republican lawmakers to “ask me to continue leading this conference, even if we have divided government.”

When asked about previous House speakers leaving Congress after their party lost control of the House of Representatives, Johnson responded, “I’m going to continue to serve my highest best use to God in country, and I believe right now, as we’re sitting here, that’s the Speaker of the House.”

“And if we lost the majority, I don’t think that that position that I have would change. I think I would stay right there.”

Johnson also addressed comments he made to Fox News last week, when he said, “Heaven forbid, if we lose this majority or whatever, I don’t know what my next chapter of life is.”

“If God moves on our hearts and says we should, you know, go back to my hometown of Shreveport and start a lawn business, I’ll do that with equal fervor,” he told the outlet on Oct. 8.

But Johnson told CBS Monday that the lawn care remark was meant in jest and said his point was that his “number one objective is to be of my highest and best use to God and to my country, and that’s always what I’ve thought.”

If “God has a different design, then we’ll follow that,” he said. “But what I believe is, I’m going to be the Speaker of the House for at least two more years.”

Both Johnson and President Donald Trump have been campaigning across the United States in a bid to boost GOP candidates ahead of the Nov. 3 election, which could determine which party controls either the House or the Senate. Republicans have small majorities in both chambers.

Trump and Johnson have recently focused on reducing violent crime.

“Do you know that right now we have the lowest violent crime rate in 126 years in America right now? Because we emphasize the rule of law,” Johnson told an audience at Louisiana State University earlier this month. “We have the most secure border we have had in the past half century.”

Trump returned to the topic during an event in Nebraska last week, warning about how the country had been before he returned to the White House.

“We had a border with people pouring in, crime like nobody’s ever seen,” he said, also touting his administration’s efforts to bolster border security.

The president has also said that if Republicans win the House and Senate next month, he would move to send $5,000 payments to Americans, saying the U.S. economy would continue to post gains.

Democrats and some Republicans, however, have said that the plan would increase the national deficit and cause inflation to surge.

In an advertisement released Monday, Trump appeared to double down on sending the payments despite the criticism. Johnson said last month that the president would need Congress to authorize those payments.

He said that if Republicans retain their majorities in Congress in the election, “you will each have $5,000 in your pocket, and economic success for our country like we have never ever seen before.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.