House Republicans are stuck between a rock and a hard place as Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) weighs options that can help Congress avoid a government shutdown before Friday’s deadline and keep him from facing the wrath of his party.
Johnson and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), along with Senate leaders and President Joe Biden, are set to meet on Tuesday morning to discuss keeping the government open beyond March 1, when four appropriations bills are set to expire.
Both the House and Senate must produce their own separate 12 appropriations bills before coming together to finalize one budget to fund the government. The House has not made any progress on its spending bills since November and has passed only seven of the 12. The Senate has passed just three.
House GOP leaders have several choices to move forward, but they face opposition from the right flank of the Republican Party. Some refuse to vote on a spending package unless it’s one bill at a time, while others are floating the idea of a clean continuing resolution with Democrats — but the latter could spell doom for Johnson’s speakership.
If lawmakers can’t extend government funding by Friday, a temporary stopgap bill may be the only option to buy more time.
Minibus
Some House GOP leaders have floated packaging appropriations bills into a “minibus” to keep Agriculture, Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, Transportation and Housing and Urban Development, and Energy and Water agencies funded.
This option will likely spark opposition from members such as Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), who has long pushed for appropriations bills to be voted on one at a time.
Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy vowed no longer to use the procedure after Republicans took control of the House after the 2022 midterm elections. However, since the package is smaller and would leave out some of the remaining appropriations bills, which expire on March 8, it may appeal to more GOP lawmakers.
A version of the minibus could include three of the four appropriations bills with an attached CR for the fourth bill, which would kick the bill down to another deadline, possibly lasting a week or shorter. The minibus could also include some bills with the March 8 deadline, but that would depend on whether they are ready to be pushed through. Given the fluidity of the negotiations, however, it is unclear whether this will be put on the table or if leaders will focus simply on the bills with a March 1 deadline.
Freedom Caucus demands
House Freedom Caucus members released a long list of demands last week for what they want to see in spending negotiations, placing Johnson in a tough spot, as he can only afford to lose two Republican votes on a spending bill.
Among the policies Freedom Caucus members are demanding are defunding the Pentagon’s abortion policy, prohibiting gun registry and red-flag gun law funding, and blocking the Biden administration’s attempts to remove parts of the wall at the southern border.
If Johnson does not place those policies in a spending bill, the hard-line Republicans are demanding a one-year temporary funding bill that would implement 1% budget cuts across the board and keep spending at the same levels installed by former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA).
A one-year temporary funding bill would likely trigger opposition from Democrats, who have expressed opposition to a CR that would result in budget cuts. This places Johnson at a crossroads at which he must either side with hard-line Republicans or make a deal with Democrats that could easily pass both chambers.
‘Clean’ CR
A final option, and the most risky for Johnson’s position as speaker, would be to pass a continuing resolution without new cuts. Favored overwhelmingly by Democrats, a clean CR would extend funding for the government without any budget cuts across the board.
Since Republicans took control of the House, the chamber has passed three such CRs: one under McCarthy and two under Johnson. Placing such a CR on the floor triggered Gaetz and seven House Republicans to vacate McCarthy from the speakership in October.
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Under Johnson, he passed two clean CRs that broke the deadlines for the 12 appropriations bills into two. The first was passed in November, and in January, he extended those deadlines to March 1 and March 8. If Johnson chooses to go for another clean CR this week, it is likely to cause an uproar among the GOP’s right flank and possibly place a target on his back for a motion to vacate.
However, getting Democrats on board could be an uphill battle, as both parties are blaming each other for the time crunch in passing spending bills. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) blamed House Republicans for spending time “causing chaos than passing legislation.” Johnson pushed back against this, accusing Schumer of using “counterproductive rhetoric” while lawmakers continued to work to come to an agreement.
