The race to prevent a government shutdown next month is colliding with Republican efforts to enact President Trump’s tax and funding priorities.
Congressional negotiators have been struggling for weeks to strike a bipartisan deal that would keep the government funded past a mid-March deadline. At the same time, House Republicans are racing to pass a bill through the budget reconciliation process that would contain large swaths of Trump’s agenda. The House is set to vote on a budget resolution that would be the blueprint for that eventual bill on Tuesday.
And this week, a number of hard-line conservatives tied the two efforts together, threatening to complicate both.
Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio), one of several Republicans who have come out against the House GOP’s budget resolution, told reporters Tuesday that leadership “could communicate a binding plan for discretionary spending ahead of March 14” if they want to secure his support for the budget bill.
He additionally called for Congress to lock in some of the measures pursued by Trump and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) aimed at reshaping government and cutting spending.
Republicans hope to use budget reconciliation to jam through Congress a partisan package that would allow for trillions of dollars in tax cuts, reduce spending north of $1 trillion, boost funding for defense, border and deportation plans — and all without Democratic support.
Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), another conservative, has backed the GOP’s budget plan. But Tuesday, he also fired a warning shot over government spending.
“What Republicans need to understand and leadership too, broadly, is if they’re going to try to continue to plus up appropriations to go do a deal with Democrats, then that is going to blow up reconciliation,” Roy said.
While Roy said he’s “OK moving this budget forward as it is,” he also warned that if GOP leaders work out a “bipartisan spending package where you’re going to jack up defense spending, then don’t come to me and ask for defense spending in reconciliation.”
Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.), head of the House Freedom Caucus, also said he’s still planning to vote for the budget resolution, but he told The Hill, “Before a final vote on a reconciliation bill, we’d have to be satisfied that we are not going to let defense spending get out of control.”
“If you’re going to increase defense spending on the discretionary side, if you expect defense increases on the mandatory side, there are going to have to be changes,” he said.
Pressed about Davidson’s comments Tuesday, House Appropriations Committee Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said, “I disagree with that totally.”
“First of all, you should evaluate each bill for what it is, but telling us that you get to decide what we do in appropriations, or you overturn that, to me, is unacceptable,” Cole said. “They’re not related to one another, and so again, everybody can do what they want on their votes. If you’re against the budget deal, I’m not. I’m for it.”
“If somebody’s got a specific question, happy to sit down with them,” Cole added. “But look, I don’t try and tell other committees what to do that I’m not a member of.”
Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) told reporters Tuesday that negotiators are “making progress” toward an agreement on a top-line number on how much to fund the government into early fall.
“There have been, lately, good faith discussions,” she said. “Including last night, and I think, to quote Chairman Cole, that we’re virtually there on the numbers.”
By numbers, Collins clarified she was referring to top-line discussions, as well as “the sub-allocations for defense and nondefense discretionary spending.”
Some conservatives have been pushing for a stopgap that would keep funding levels flat through September, the end of fiscal 2025. They argue preventing increases on the defense side in bipartisan funding talks would help the party fight Democratic asks for increases to nondefense funding.
But other Republicans have pushed back against the pitch for a longer-term stopgap, citing concerns around defense programs.
Cole said the “best thing would be a negotiated deal,” telling reporters Tuesday afternoon that negotiators are “closer than we were when we started.”
“Second-best thing would be a [continuing resolution], and that allows negotiations to continue. The third would be a yearlong,” he said. “The worst thing would be a shutdown. So, that’s the hierarchy, at least, as I see it.”
