House and Senate Republicans remain on a collision course over Donald Trump’s agenda. And the president’s signature issue is at the center of it.
Trump's "border czar" Tom Homan and budget director Russ Vought trekked to Capitol Hill on Tuesday to meet with Senate Republicans, Sahil Kapur, Melanie Zanona, Kate Santaliz and Frank Thorp V report. The message? “More money, more success,” Homan said afterward.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., the chair of the Senate Budget Committee, said the administration is asking for an additional $175 billion to fund its immigration crackdown and mass deportation plans.
“Tom Homan said, ‘I am begging you for money,’” Graham told reporters. “Russ Vought said that, ‘We’re running out of money for [Immigration and Customs Enforcement]. We can’t rob other accounts any longer.’”
Graham has used this to support his two-bill strategy for Trump’s agenda: Work on one bill now dealing with the border, defense and energy, and then turn to another dealing with extending Trump’s 2017 tax cut law. He plans to mark up and vote on a budget resolution for the first set of issues Wednesday and Thursday.
But House Republicans are forging ahead with their own markup Thursday on a budget resolution that includes the tax overhaul in addition to the border and other policy areas. House GOP leaders want to move forward with one bill, fearing that the parts that are left out in the first package will fail to get enough support later in the year, given their tiny majority.
“To my friends in the House: We’re moving because we have to. I wish you the best. I want ‘one big, beautiful bill’ — but I cannot, and I will not go back to South Carolina and justify not supporting the president’s immigration plan,” Graham said. “We’re not building a wall, folks. We’re hitting a wall. They need the money, and they need it now.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson and his allies hadn’t released the text of the budget resolution as of late Tuesday afternoon as Johnson struggles to unify his fractious conference around a massive package. The far-right House Freedom Caucus is skeptical of Johnson’s one-bill strategy, instead proposing its own two-track process that tackles immigration money first.
Even once they settle the one bill vs. two bills debate, Republicans still have a long road ahead: Congress cannot officially begin work on a reconciliation package until both the House and Senate pass identical budget resolutions.
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