House Speaker Mike Johnson is convinced he has a grip on his caucus, even as reports circulate that his control is slipping.

The chief House Republican rebuked comments made by Representative Elise Stefanik, who told The Wall Street Journal Tuesday that the speaker would not have enough support among his caucus to win the speakership if the vote took place this week.

Speaking with PBS Newshour correspondent Lisa Desjardins Wednesday, Johnson insisted that Republicans in Congress were “united” behind him.

“I’m not sure how to comment on what Elise is doing or what the rationale behind this is, but you can talk to Republicans in Congress, 99.9 percent are united, we’re working together to keep delivering our agenda,” Johnson told PBS.

“I talked to Elise late last night. We talked through what I thought were a misunderstanding of the facts,” he continued, making mention of the National Defense Authorization Act. Stefanik claimed victory regarding the bill Wednesday morning, announcing that a provision she wrote related to congressional disclosures would be included in the act after a “productive” conversation with Johnson and Donald Trump.

“I told her, you could have just picked up the phone and called me initially and not had to do all this other stuff,” Johnson told PBS.

But Desjardins underscored that plenty of other members of the caucus had expressed their discontent with Johnson’s leadership.

Just nine representatives of the majority party are needed to trigger a vote of no confidence against a House speaker. Those lawmakers could include Stefanik, as well as Representative Anna Paulina Luna, who on Tuesday openly defied Johnson by introducing a discharge petition that would bypass his direction on a bipartisan bill regarding insider trading. It could also include Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, who announced last month her intention to exit office in early January.

The Trump administration is taking aim at the Somali American community in Minnesota with an immigration crackdown, punctuated by President Trump on Tuesday calling Representative Ilhan Omar, a Somali American herself, “garbage,” along with the rest of her community.

Since then, Trump’s staff have been defending his racism. Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin was asked by CNN’s John Berman Wednesday exactly how much of the Somali American community in Minnesota, an estimated 40,000 of whom were born in Somalia, could be considered garbage. Her response was a word salad nowhere near a condemnation.

“John, we’re really looking at the data, the analyses here particularly out of Minneapolis, and other parts of the country where we’re seeing Somalia, there’s widespread fraud, particularly marriage fraud when it comes to immigration, we’re looking at criminality here,” McLaughlin said. Berman then repeated his question.

“My question is, all of them? The president says he doesn’t want them here. He called them ‘garbage.’ Do you consider that to be all of the 40,000 people born in Somalia now living in Minnesota?” Berman asked.

“John, this is not about politics, this is about public safety,” McLaughlin replied, referencing last week’s shooting of two National Guard members, allegedly by an Afghan national, in Washington, D.C.

“That’s what the precipice of this was. That’s why we have to get back to base camp and make sure we are prioritizing the American people’s safety,” McLaughlin added, before criticizing the Biden administration for poor vetting processes.

BERMAN: How many of the 40,000 people born in Somalia living in Minnesota do you consider to be garbage?

McLAUGHLIN: We're really looking at the data

BERMAN: All of them?

McLAUGHLIN: This is not about politics. This is about public safety. We saw the terrorist attack against… pic.twitter.com/Tyce74f3yU

The Somali community in Minnesota, particularly in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area, has nothing to do with last week’s shooting. But, it’s clear that McLaughlin is speaking not just for DHS, but for the entire administration by failing to address the president calling an entire ethnic group and community garbage.

Instead, McLaughlin is using the shooting to justify an immigration crackdown on Somalis in Minnesota, 58 percent of whom were born in the U.S., with 87 percent of those born overseas being naturalized U.S. citizens, according to Census data. But she’s only following the president’s racist lead, and he was inspired by a story full of holes originating from right-wing media.

A bad week has gotten even worse for Pete Hegseth, as a new watchdog report from the Pentagon inspector general’s office finds that the defense secretary directly endangered U.S. troops when he used the Signal messaging app to discuss sensitive plans to bomb the Houthi rebels in Yemen back in March. 

Sources told CNN that the classified report details Hegseth’s lack of urgency and seriousness in........

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