In the span of 24 hours, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) announced he had reached a deal with Democrats to fund the government until March 2025, dissed the same deal in public statements meant to support it, and watched as the deal fell apart after his fellow Republicans revolted.
It was an entirely predictable result. For the entirety of the 118th Congress, Republicans have railed against top-down legislating, wherein leaders of both parties negotiate a bill behind closed doors and then expect their members to simply vote for whatever is produced. There is also a cohort of Republicans who are steadfastly opposed to the idea of any continuing resolution whatsoever, instead demanding that all government funding be appropriated through 12 individual spending bills.
But the 1,500-page behemoth bill that only funds the government through March was hardly the bill that rank-and-file Republicans, centrists, and conservatives alike were expecting. What was expected to be a short-term extension to keep the government open with some additional disaster relief funding, turned into a pork-filled monstrosity that included pay raises for members of Congress, a lease to the District of Columbia to build a new football stadium, funding to rebuild the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Maryland, and a provision to block subpoenas of House data.
The bill’s death within hours was entirely predictable, and it has now raised questions about Johnson’s ability to lead the House when the new Congress is sworn in next month.
Now, Johnson’s decision to unilaterally negotiate with Democrats without a clear idea of what his conference was looking for is a mess of his own making. But it doesn’t mean that Democrats have been good-faith partners in the process either.
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Johnson and House Republicans at least tried to pass the 12 appropriations bills. Six of the 12 were brought to a vote, and five passed. But in the Democratic-controlled senate, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) refused to bring a single appropriations bill to the floor for a vote. Instead, he dedicated every minute of available floor time to jamming through President Joe Biden’s last judicial nominees to ensure that President-elect Donald Trump could not fill vacancies in the federal court system.
But Johnson could have navigated the negotiations with Democrats far better if he had simply listened to what his conference was willing or unwilling to accept. Instead, he tried to impose more top-down rule and, in doing so, put his own job in jeopardy.