Mike Johnson’s latest government funding plan seems to be a charade. Whether anyone will really be convinced of it is the question.
House Speaker Mike Johnson is bringing lawmakers back to Washington next week with a plan that would keep the government open and extract concessions from Democrats in exchange for Congress fulfilling its most basic duties. Much of the GOP conference likes the plan, including most of the far right. And even if his gambit fails, they think Johnson is putting some Democrats in a tough political spot.
The problem is everyone seems to know the plan is a charade that is doomed to fail.
As Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie told NOTUS, Congress is about to perform some “failure theater.”
Johnson’s plan is to pair a six-month government funding extension with the SAVE Act, a bill that requires proof of citizenship in order to register to vote. It is already illegal for noncitizens to vote in federal elections, but Republican lawmakers claim some states aren’t vigilant enough while registering voters. Democrats generally oppose the SAVE Act, noting that current law already prohibits noncitizens from voting and raising concerns that stricter requirements would only make it more difficult to register eligible voters. The SAVE Act has already passed the House with unanimous Republican support and approval from five Democrats.
In a call with the speaker this week, several vulnerable House Republicans sounded the alarm that a shutdown would hurt their reelection chances. One source who was on the call told NOTUS that Rep. Nick LaLota asked Johnson what would happen when the Senate strips out the SAVE Act and sends back a clean continuing resolution. Johnson, according to this source, didn’t want to discuss that outcome during their conversation. Instead, he said Republicans should demonstrate a unanimous desire to keep the SAVE Act in the bill.
“Many Republican members, particularly those in swing districts, have huge concerns about a government shutdown weeks before the general election,” one GOP member who shares those concerns told NOTUS. “Allowing our military and border patrol to go unpaid as would be the case during a shutdown is simply unacceptable.”
But with Johnson’s current plan, almost every Republican in the House seems to be able to find something they can take away from the process.
“TOTALLY AGREE WITH THIS ACTION,” Freedom Caucus member Rep. Ralph Norman texted NOTUS when asked about Johnson’s plan. “HOWEVER WE HAVE TO NOT RETREAT!”
It’s the “NOT RETREAT” part that may be difficult.
GOP leaders have tried similar tactics in the past, essentially passing government funding bills with conservative policies attached, watching the Senate strip them out and then letting House Republicans decide whether they’d prefer more doomed negotiations or a government shutdown. In 2013, Republicans went with a government shutdown, demanding the Senate repeal Obamacare in exchange for funding the government. At the end of 2018, Republicans shut down portions of the federal government while insisting that a Democratic Senate fund Trump’s border wall.
But that plan has its own critics, including House Appropriations Chairman Tom Cole. The Oklahoma Republican has repeatedly argued that Congress should make a real attempt at funding the government this year instead of holding out for a potential Trump administration.
Whoever wins the presidency, he said, “will probably make the decision: Do you want to get these bills done before you come into office, or do you want to show up with the possibility of a shutdown right in front of you?”
“I don’t think we ought to do that to a president,” Cole told NOTUS. “But I don’t get to make that decision all by myself.”
