House and Senate Republicans had hoped that by mid-March they would be well on their way to passing a fiscal 2017 budget and drawing up corresponding legislation for the 12 spending bills that will fund the federal government next year.
But a March budget deal has been stymied by inter-party disagreements over spending levels. And once again, Congress is facing a prolonged spending fight that results in the last-minute passage of an unpopular “omnibus” bill.
Congress has set a deadline of April 15 to pass a budget. Without one, Republicans will lack the consensus and budgetary parameters that make it easier to pass individual spending bills.
They’ll also lose the ability to employ the budget reconciliation process, which allows them to make reforms with only 51 votes needed for passage in the Senate, rather than the typical 60 votes.
“We are working through it, we’ll get there,” House Budget Chairman Tom Price, R-Ga., said after meeting with GOP lawmakers this month.
In the Senate, lawmakers announced they were postponing committee consideration of a budget, which comes after the House seemed to falter in its efforts to send one to the Senate Budget panel by an April 1 deadline.
“House Republicans’ radical dysfunction has clearly infected their Senate Republican colleagues,” said Drew Hammill, spokesman for House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.
Most House Republicans have rejected an opening bid from Price that would have set 2017 spending levels at $1.07 trillion. That’s the number House and Senate Republicans and Democrats approved last year. It raises spending by $30 billion over caps mandated in the 2011 Budget Control Act, a measure signed into law in order to reduce the deficit.
Conservatives gave the Price budget a “thumbs down” because of the $30 billion increase. They want the number lowered to $1.04 trillion in order to adhere to the caps.
“They seem to be repeating the same things,” Rep. Raul Labrador, R-Idaho, said after the Price budget pitch.
Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, a member of the Budget Committee and chair of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, noted the nation’s current $19 trillion debt is the result of ever-increasing federal spending levels.
Spending needs to be reduced in order to stop the debt and deficit from increasing, Jordan told the Washington Examiner.
“That’s pretty fundamental,” Jordan said.
Republican leaders have proposed a way to cut spending growth while leaving intact the $1.07 trillion bipartisan agreement. They offered conservatives a measure that would cut entitlement spending by $30 billion.
It’s a proposal that would seem tailored for fiscal conservative lawmakers, who have long sought legislation to reduce the growing cost of entitlements, which include Medicare, Social Security, Medicaid, welfare and Obamacare.
But conservatives aren’t backing it.
A standalone measure cutting entitlements would never receive a vote in the Senate, they argue, or get signed into law by President Obama.
“We all know it’s with a wink and a nod,” Rep. John Fleming, R-La., told the Examiner. “It’s not going to happen.”
Rep. Bill Flores, R-Texas, who is head of the Republican Study Committee, the largest faction of conservative lawmakers, said Republicans have voted for five budgets in recent years that called for reining in entitlement costs. None was considered by the Senate and won’t likely receive consideration this year, Flores said, even though Republicans are in the majority.
“I don’t see the Senate taking any hard votes this year,” Flores said.
Senate Republicans are facing a tough election battle that puts their majority in jeopardy.
But Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., didn’t rule it out.
“We’re always going to be flooded with more bills from the House than we can possibly deal with,” McConnell told the Examiner. “But I’m anxious to take a look at anything they send us.”
