Overview

• Newly appointed House Speaker Mike Johnson has a Black son, Michael, whom he took into care 24 years ago and raised as his own alongside his four biological children.
• Michael's exclusion from Johnson's public profile and family photos is due to his personal request for privacy since Mike Johnson's election to Congress, according to Johnson's communications director Corinne Day.
• Johnson has faced criticism from all sides due to his comments on race which often include references to his experiences of raising Michael.
• Officially, the Johnsons did not formally adopt Michael due to the lengthy adoption process.
• Johnson has often spoken publicly about Michael, linking him to conversations about race, and even likened the experience of raising him to the movie 'The Blind Side'.