U.S. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson secured enough votes, 217-215, to pass a budget resolution on Tuesday night, advancing a Republican effort to extend tax breaks and cut spending that Democrats called “reckless.”
“We have a lot of hard work ahead of us, but we are going to deliver the America First agenda,” Johnson told reporters. “We’re going to deliver all of it, not just parts of it, and this is the first step in that process.”
Johnson and other House Republican leaders said in a statement their goal is a bill “that secures our border, keeps taxes low for families and job creators, restores American energy dominance, strengthens America’s standing on the world stage, and makes government work more effectively for all Americans.”
House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries said Republicans are working to “slash and burn” programs such as veterans’ benefits, food assistance, and health care for lower-income people.
“The reckless Republican budget will cut taxes up to $4.5 trillion for the wealthy, the well-off and the well-connected, and then they are sticking working-class Americans, middle-class Americans and everyday Americans with the bill,” Jeffries told reporters.
Before the vote, several members of the House Republican conference were still concerned about the size of the spending measure, how and when to enact a proposed extension of the 2017 tax cuts, and how to pay down the U.S. deficit without cutting key safety net programs that help American voters. Senate leadership has proposed passing the tax cuts in a separate bill later this year.
“Not only are we working to find savings for the American taxpayer, a better, more efficient use of their dollar, which we are morally obligated to do, we also have a moral obligation to bend the curve on the debt,” Johnson said.
President Donald Trump has called for lawmakers to pass “one big, beautiful bill” that will be a key part of enacting his domestic policy agenda.
Despite Trump expressing his preference for the House of Representatives version of the budget, the Senate passed a funding resolution Friday that provides $150 billion in military funding and $175 billion for border security. That measure also avoids the controversial Medicaid cuts of the House version.
Republican Representative Tony Gonzales led a group of seven House Republicans warning against potential cuts to health care program Medicaid, food assistance funding and other social safety net programs.
“Slashing Medicaid would have serious consequences, particularly in rural and predominantly Hispanic communities where hospitals and nursing homes are already struggling to keep their doors open,” the lawmakers said in a letter to Johnson last week.
Trump posted on Truth Social last week that “The House and Senate are doing a SPECTACULAR job of working together as one unified, and unbeatable, TEAM, however, unlike the Lindsey Graham version of the very important Legislation currently being discussed, the House Resolution implements my FULL America First Agenda, EVERYTHING, not just parts of it!”
The House and Senate bills will now have to be compromised to be signed into law.
If lawmakers cannot reach a compromise by March 14, there will be a partial government shutdown, leaving millions of federal employees temporarily without pay and suspending some nonessential government services.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune did not rule out the possibility of another short-term spending bill to give lawmakers more time to work.
“We’re keeping all the options on the table, but we are running out of time,” Thune told reporters Tuesday.
The Senate moved forward with a vote on its version of the budget due to uncertainty over the potential success of the vote on the House version.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer characterized the vote as a first step toward hurting voters.
“Make no mistake, it will rob seniors, kids and the disabled to pay for the rich to get richer. It’s wrong. We’re going to use every lever we have at our disposal to lift up the concerns that we are hearing from our constituents, band together and organize with them and fight to stop this tax break for billionaires,” Schumer told reporters Tuesday.
