{"id":63907,"date":"2025-11-25T05:01:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-25T05:01:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/63907\/"},"modified":"2025-11-25T05:01:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-25T05:01:09","slug":"speaker-johnson-defends-crenshaw-after-he-was-reportedly-banned-from-congressional-overseas-travel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/63907\/","title":{"rendered":"Speaker Johnson defends Crenshaw after he was reportedly banned from congressional overseas travel"},"content":{"rendered":"

Audio recording is automated for accessibility. Humans wrote and edited the story. See our AI policy <\/a> , and give us feedback <\/a> . <\/p>\n

WASHINGTON \u2014\u00a0Speaker Mike Johnson is defending U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw<\/a>, R-Houston, in the wake of a report<\/a> that his behavior on a congressional delegation trip to Mexico in August was inappropriate.<\/p>\n

The dispute stems from an incident in which Crenshaw, a member of the House Intelligence Committee and the chair of a now-dissolved cartel task force, reportedly toasted a Mexican official who had made a crude joke that made a woman in the room uncomfortable, according to anonymous sources in Punchbowl News. <\/p>\n

Following the trip, Punchbowl reported that House Intelligence Committee chair Rick Crawford, R-Arkansas, banned Crenshaw from taxpayer-funded travel outside the country for 90 days. Crawford saw that decision \u201cas being authorized by the GOP leadership,\u201d Punchbowl reported.<\/p>\n

The outlet went on to report<\/a> Monday that Central Intelligence Agency officials in Mexico City sent a cable to CIA headquarters in Langley raising concerns about Crenshaw\u2019s behavior.<\/p>\n

In a statement shared with The Texas Tribune, Johnson said he stands by Crenshaw and trusts his leadership on cartels.<\/p>\n

\u201cDan Crenshaw has always been and still is our point man in Congress when it comes to addressing the threat of the drug cartels,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cHis insights and expertise in these and other matters regarding intelligence and national security are invaluable. As a former Navy SEAL, he has earned his large platform. Despite recent media attacks by his political opponents, we know Dan, we stand by his record, and we have full confidence he will continue to deliver results.\u201d<\/p>\n

Crenshaw has disputed the merits of Punchbowl\u2019s story, including that he was banned from traveling<\/a>. He argued that the outlet\u2019s portrayal of the incident was overblown, writing on X<\/a> that the allegedly offensive toast happened in the middle of the day, at the end of a meeting with Mexican officials about dealing with cartels.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnyone shocked by guys in uniform making a crass joke over a toast has never spent more than five minutes around the military,\u201d a Crenshaw spokesperson told Punchbowl. \u201cThe only story here is a pathetic political hit job.\u201d<\/p>\n

Punchbowl also reported that Crawford had tried to remove Crenshaw from his panel, but that Johnson allowed Crenshaw to retain his seat.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Audio recording is automated for accessibility. Humans wrote and edited the story. See our AI policy , and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":63908,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[2671,27691,56,58,57,287,293,6588],"class_list":{"0":"post-63907","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston","8":"tag-congress","9":"tag-dan-crenshaw","10":"tag-houston","11":"tag-houston-headlines","12":"tag-houston-news","13":"tag-politics","14":"tag-texas-legislature","15":"tag-well-c-homepage"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63907"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63907\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}