Press Releases

WASHINGTON — This morning, at the weekly House Republican Leadership press conference, Speaker Johnson discussed the early success of Operation Epic Fury and stressed the need for Congress to fully fund the Department of Homeland Security amid warnings of lone wolf and sleeper cell attacks on the homeland.

“As members of this body, our first and most basic duty is to ensure the safety of American citizens; maybe that's why [Democrats] sat through that line at the State of the Union. They're more interested in protecting illegal aliens. They see that as their first responsibility. There's no other way to explain this,” Speaker Johnson said. “If they ever want to correct the impression that their party prioritizes the welfare of illegal aliens over the welfare of American citizens, tomorrow would be a great place to start.”

Watch Speaker Johnson’s press conference remarks here.

On Operation Epic Fury:

We're 4 days in so far on Operation Epic Fury. It's been limited, precise, and extremely lethal. It's been a remarkable success thus far as recounted as recently as the last couple of hours by those leaders I mentioned. The early results are very encouraging. Iran’s naval fleet is degraded – that was the first part of the mission, or at least the second part. The first part was the missiles, and its missile facilities in Iran and the stockpiles have severely depleted. Its former Ayatollah, the mastermind behind decades of terrorist violence, recounted by Chairman Mast and all of us over the last several days, he is now deceased.

The administration has detailed its rationale behind the operation and it bears repeating: The largest state sponsor of terrorism – Iran and its proxies – have killed more Americans than any other terrorist regime on Earth. They are dedicated to it. They have been and they say the quiet parts out loud. They wanted to wipe Israel off the face of the Earth and they would like to take us out as well. We're the “Great Satan” in their analogy, in their misguided religion, and there was no way to appease them.

In defiance of every American president since Jimmy Carter, the Iranian regime has pursued the means to acquire a nuclear weapon so that they could take that madness and that ideology to its full conclusion. Everyone, regardless of political affiliation, should be able to agree that that can never happen and should never happen. 

On President Trump securing peace through strength:

In short, the situation was untenable. We had our personnel, troops, citizens, installations, and assets in harm's way, and through this operation, President Trump took decisive and defensive action to ensure the safety of our forces, our citizens, our allies, and our homeland. In my estimation, this course of action was necessary, lawful and effective, and reversing it now would weaken America. Congress has a constitutional right to exercise its oversight authority and we will, but we also have a duty and obligation not to undercut our own national security.

One last note: There is a misconception that Operation Epic Fury is in any way a diversion from Republican demands for peace. It's the opposite. Peace is not secured through appeasement, and it's certainly not secured by airdropping billions of dollars on terrorist regimes, which is what previous Democrat administrations have done. Peace is secured through strength. That is the principle that our party has stood for my entire life. That's what this administration is demonstrating and that is why America is the last great superpower on the planet, and all freedom-loving people around the world are grateful to God for that. 

On the need to protect our homeland and fund DHS amid heightened threats:

We all remember that under Joe Biden, Democrats opened wide our nation’s borders for 4 catastrophic years. They allowed hundreds on the terrorist watch list across our border illegally and unwittingly. They released 2.2 million known gateways into the interior. We have no idea where so many of those individuals are. These are individuals who entered our country illegally. They were detected by law enforcement, and they evaded capture. We don't know where they are, we don't know what they're doing, or what they're plotting. And we pray that we can find them and apprehend them. Keep your head on a swivel.

CBP figures show that the number of Iranian nationals entering our country illegally rose precipitously under Joe Biden’s open borders policy. During that period at least 1,500 Iranians crossed the US border illegally and over 700 were released into the country. Now the 1,500 number is not an accurate assessment because we frankly have no idea because they weren't even keeping track of so many of the people coming across, who evaded capture, and evaded notice because the border was wide open. So, we don't know how many dangerous people are here – how many Iranians who believed in that ideology of the Ayatollah, who now is buried. Think about that. Over 1,500 Iranian nationals traveled multiple oceans to enter the U.S., not through legal ports of entry, but unlawfully at our border. It's just a small sample of the mess we inherited from Democrats with their radical ideology, and the mess that President Trump and Republicans are working in earnest to clean up so we can save American lives and protect the homeland.