A crucial vote to further President Donald Trump‘s agenda appeared to be doomed just moments before, but Speaker Mike Johnson pulled off a stunning comeback Tuesday night.
Johnson and his leadership team surprised even some of his detractors by successfully overcoming many Republican stalwarts to enact a budget blueprint that will serve as the foundation for advancing Trump’s ambitious agenda, capping hours of drama in the Capitol. Trump’s last-minute phone calls helped GOP leaders launch a ferocious lobbying campaign to gain support for their plan, which lasted the entire Tuesday.
“Today was not the end of the world. Regarding the whiplash in the House, however, Texas Republican Representative Pat Fallon stated, “I do see the edge.”
Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, a fiscal hawk, was the only vote Johnson ultimately lost, and it was all he could afford. The Democrats’ whip team hurried to secure nearly complete attendance on their side: Representative Kevin Mullin, who is recuperating from knee surgery problems, flew from California with an IV, and Representative Brittany Pettersen flew with her 4-week-old infant to arrive in time for the vote.
The drama won’t stop there, though, as Johnson and his supporters admit that the future will be far more challenging. The vote on Tuesday night was merely a procedural one, and now that they have different plans, GOP leaders in the House and Senate will need to agree on how to proceed with Trump’s extensive legislative package. It will be extremely challenging to pass that package in both chambers due to the acrimonious rifts among Republicans that were exposed during the days-long debate over the House budget blueprint.
However, Trump and Johnson’s victory comes at a crucial moment as their party faces pressing deadlines, such as averting a government shutdown next month and the possibility of an economic default later this spring. Similar to Tuesday night’s vote, the GOP will need to work together almost entirely to navigate those political minefields.
Now, Republican leaders will begin working on the specifics of what would be included in Trump’s initial legislative package. The recently passed House GOP plan includes extra funding for energy production and border protection, along with drastic expenditure cuts, substantial tax cuts, and a two-year debt ceiling extension. However, the Senate’s plan only includes funding for energy and national defense, deferring the more controversial issues to later.
The stakes are high for GOP leaders because Trump wants to get his plan passed as soon as possible, but party leaders have to adhere to the very stringent budgetary restrictions that let their party pass a package without the support of Democrats. Republicans will also need to exercise caution when it comes to reforming well-known programs like Pell grants, Medicaid, and food assistance—concerns that almost brought down this week’s budget agreement.
Johnson had a rollercoaster 12-hour day that culminated in the successful vote. He met tensely with House Republicans in the morning to persuade them to support the budget plan or risk missing out on important aspects of Trump’s agenda.
Even the unyieldingly optimistic Johnson said he might have to pull it by the afternoon, when House GOP leaders were still having trouble securing the votes.
Around 7:30 p.m., the speaker decided to call off holding the vote altogether because there were no votes. However, his leadership team was able to convince the remaining dissenters with the aid of a Trump call to Representative Victoria Spartz. Johnson brought the members back to vote shortly after they were dismissed, and the GOP’s budget plan was approved.
Although he provided no details, Ohio Republican Representative Warren Davidson stated that he changed his vote after receiving “assurances” of a future proposal to reduce discretionary expenditure that may pass the Senate.
Spartz went on to declare that she has discussed health care issues with Trump and that “he’s on board to get some great things done on health care.” I believe what he says.
Earlier Tuesday, leadership ally Rep. Dusty Johnson admitted, “I think the last few weeks are showing us how difficult it is to move any package through the House.” “This crew is diverse.”
Even though centrist-leaning Republicans were still concerned about the size of the expenditure cuts and whether they would affect well-known programs like Medicaid, hardline conservatives maintained that the package did not contain enough cuts in spending hours before the scheduled vote. Additionally, in other places, Johnson’s attempts to gain support backfired. Massie claimed that he was even more critical of the budget after leaving a meeting on Tuesday morning.
With a large bundle of leadership talking points in hand, the Republican from Kentucky blasted their ideas line by line, saying, “They convinced me in there, I’m a no.” Massie was still the only GOP “no” at the time of the vote.
Over the past few days, Johnson and his whip team had been attempting to appease their more moderate members, many of whom had expressed worries that the budget proposal may eventually result in Medicaid, the low-income health program, being eliminated.
Because Trump has promised not to touch Medicare, Republicans from northeastern states were especially concerned about plans to cut $880 billion over ten years from federal health and energy programs. They believe this cannot be accomplished without cutting Medicaid, the extremely costly health program, before the vote.
The notion that benefits will be reduced has been aggressively resisted by GOP leaders, who have pointed out that the budget proposal is merely a framework and not a precise policy. Although it’s unclear where such savings would come from, they contend that there are methods to reduce hundreds of billions of dollars in unnecessary spending on government health programs without reducing Medicaid coverage.
This vote is purely procedural. When asked about swing seat lawmakers’ worries about Medicaid cuts, House Majority Whip Tom Emmer told CNN, “You tell me what the cuts are.”
Ultimately, Johnson documented just one Republican flaw.
Earlier in the day, when he was still short by at least six votes, the speaker said, “We will get there, as we always do.”