House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) laid out an ambitious timeline to pass a massive budget reconciliation bill later this year comprising all of President-elect Donald Trump’s biggest priorities into a single package.
The package will include policies ranging from taxes and energy to immigration and national defense, which will all be tied together in a single reconciliation bill to be passed by the House and Senate. It’s not yet clear what specific measures will be tucked into the package, but Johnson told Fox News on Sunday the goal is to finalize instructions for the reconciliation bill by February.
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“It’ll have a lot of pieces. We’ve made a lot of campaign promises; President Trump did as well, and reconciliation is the way to get it done,” Johnson told Maria Bartiromo on Sunday Morning Futures. “Reconciling the budget, which we will pass in early February, is how we’ll get all of our committees, committees of jurisdiction involved on all these big issues.”
Republicans have been planning for months to use budget reconciliation to secure early wins for Trump, utilizing the rare procedural tool to circumvent Democratic opposition in the Senate to advance key agenda items. There are certain rules for how often reconciliation can be used, and Republicans will only be able to utilize it for budget-related legislation such as taxes, spending, and the debt limit.
But Republicans can’t start moving their spending priorities through Congress on day one. Reconciliation requires both the House and Senate to pass a budget resolution, which sets tax and spending levels that are then directed to specific committees to achieve a certain budgetary outcome.
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Johnson said he hopes to accomplish that by February, which would then pave the way for committees to create legislation adhering to those outcomes. Once that is finalized, the package can be brought to the floor for a vote — which Johnson says he hopes to do by the beginning of April.
The plan comes after House Republicans met behind closed doors for roughly nine hours on Saturday to discuss their plans for reconciliation, especially as the party has disagreed on the best strategy.
Some Republicans in the Senate, including Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD), have argued that the best path forward is to split priorities into two reconciliation packages, one focusing on border and immigration and the second focusing on tax cuts. Otherwise, some argue, security at the southern border could only worsen as negotiations drag on over taxes.
“I’m very worried,” Senate Budget Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-SC) told Fox News on Sunday. “I’m very worried that if we don’t put border first and get it done, it’s going to be a nightmare for our national security.”
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But others, such as House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (R-MO), have pushed against the two-track proposal, arguing lawmakers should prioritize extending Trump’s 2017 tax cuts before they expire at the end of 2025.
At the same time, Republicans must also find a way to tuck in a measure to raise the debt ceiling before the country is expected to reach its limit as soon as this summer. During negotiations for the last continuing resolution bill, House GOP leaders made a handshake agreement to raise the debt limit by $1.5 trillion in exchange for $2.5 trillion in spending cuts elsewhere, lawmakers familiar with the talks told the Washington Examiner.