‘We Have to Overturn This!’ Trump Called Speaker Johnson Right After His Conviction to Demand a Reversal, Per Report

After he was found guilty on 34 counts of fraudulent business records, former President Donald Trump called Speaker Mike Johnson to insist, “We have to overturn this.”

This stunning development comes from a Politico Playbook report from Thursday morning, hours before Trump is set to meet with Republican Congressional leaders in the nation’s capital. Politico reports:

It’s a campaign he orchestrated in the days after his May 31 conviction on 34 felony counts in New York, starting with a phone call to the man he wanted to lead it: Speaker MIKE JOHNSON.

Trump was still angry when he made the call, according to those who have heard accounts of it from Johnson, dropping frequent F-bombs as he spoke with the soft-spoken and pious GOP leader.

“We have to overturn this,” Trump insisted.

Johnson sympathized with Trump’s frustration. He’d been among the first batch of Republican lawmakers to appear alongside Trump at the Manhattan trial. He’d been harping on DA ALVIN BRAGG’s case and the alleged broader abuse of the justice system since before he took the gavel.

The speaker didn’t really need to be convinced, one person familiar with the conversation said: Johnson, a former attorney himself, already believed the House had a role to play in addressing Trump’s predicament. The two have since spoken on the subject multiple times.

But sympathy can only go so far. With a slim majority and skittish swing-district members, Johnson is already finding it difficult to deliver for Trump.

Speaker Johnson was among the first congressional leaders to show support for Trump during his roughly seven-week trial. He even raised eyebrows when he openly condemned the New York State justice system from his influential position as Speaker of the House.