How Johnson is navigating Trump — and his first real campaign

At a rally here in Arlington last weekend, Speaker Mike Johnson took a selfie video of himself and roughly 500 people cheering and sent it to Donald Trump. At a campaign event about 500 miles south in Harlingen, the speaker whipped out his famous Trump impression.

And before the former president hosted a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania — returning to the scene of the July assassination attempt — Johnson tried to call him on the phone with a group of Republican lawmakers for moral support.

Trump later called Johnson back, when the speaker was talking with POLITICO in the back of an armored SUV weaving through the Dallas suburbs. Johnson paused mid-sentence and answered, gabbing like old friends with Trump on various topics, including the major football upset that happened earlier that day (Vanderbilt beating then-No. 1 Alabama) and a 2019 Louisiana State University game they attended together.