Top Democrat defends State of the Union protests as House speaker says he nearly ejected Omar and Tlaib – live

House Speaker Mike Johnson said he came “this close” to ejecting Democratic representatives Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib from the chamber during last night’s state of the union over their verbal protests to Trump’s remarks.

Trump told Democrats during the speech that they should be ashamed for not standing, Omar yelled back that he should be ashamed and repeatedly yelled “you have killed Americans”.

Johnson told Fox’s Sean Hannity that the retorts were “shameful”.

“I came this close to stopping them. We could have probably ejected them from the floor. I thought, let their actions speak for themselves,” he said. “If they’d gone a step further, I probably would have ejected them.”

But, he said, he thought they served as a nice “contrast” to Republicans, who were standing and celebrating and chanting throughout the speech.

“I think it was good for him to be there,” he said. “I think it’s good for the American people to see the shame that they brought upon their party and upon themselves.”