President Donald Trump was caught mocking Speaker Mike Johnson, claiming not only to be the president but also to control Johnson so thoroughly that he is, in effect, the speaker as well. This has prompted renewed questions about who is actually running the government.

Writing in The New Republic on Monday, Edith Olmsted argued that Johnson is taking "playing dumb to a whole new level." Johnson holds daily news conferences about the government shutdown, and during Monday's event, he insisted that it’s not just Republicans who control the government. Since the GOP controls the House, Senate, and White House, the claim raised eyebrows.

Johnson and top GOP senators have struggled to convince most Americans that Democrats are to blame for the shutdown.

"With the government shutdown entering its fourth week, Johnson has turned playing dumb into an art form as he abstains from actually leading his party," wrote Olmsted. "During his daily delivery of remarks to the press, Johnson has incessantly insisted he hasn’t heard about anything bad his government has done while running a deluded defense of President Donald Trump’s administration."

Democrats have repeatedly hit Republicans over the Affordable Care Act subsidies expiring, and Trump’s “big beautiful bill” ushered in significant cuts to Medicaid. Johnson claims those cuts “strengthened” Medicaid. Now, he and other Republicans say they won’t let the year end without extending the subsidies. He’s also arguing that SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) benefits can somehow rely on contingency funds after funding stops Nov. 1.

“I got a summary of the whole legal analysis, and it certainly looks legitimate to me,” Olmsted cited Johnson saying about his "trade-off" for school lunches and infant formula.

All of this, Olmsted said, is happening while he keeps his members out of Washington. If they were on Capitol Hill, they would likely be voting on releasing the Jeffrey Epstein investigation files.

Read the full column here.