Speaker Mike Johnson’s (R-La.) decision to reschedule a vote on his partisan spending plan is leaving Congress seemingly no closer to averting a government shutdown at the end of the month, as critics of the proposal on both sides of the aisle dig in their heels.
The package, which pairs a six-month stopgap with a bill requiring proof of citizenship to vote, appears destined for failure in the House on Wednesday, after a number of Republicans who staked opposition to the bill last week — forcing Johnson to scrap the vote — said they have not changed their position.
Even if the legislation does pass, however, it is doomed in the Senate, where lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are urging the Speaker to change course and back a continuing resolution (CR) that can make it to President Biden’s desk and be signed into law.
But Johnson was defiant on Tuesday, telling reporters that he is not working on any backup plans for if his gambit fails.
“I’m not having any alternative conversations,” the Speaker said.
“This is the play we're running,” he added in a conversion with The Hill, “and I'll be working around the clock to try to get it done.”
The Speaker met with GOP appropriations cardinals — the chairs of the subcommittees on the House Appropriations Committee — on Tuesday evening, many of whom left the huddle echoing Johnson: that there is no alternative route.
“The Speaker said there is no plan B,” Rep. Chuck Flesichman (R-Tenn.) said.
Johnson has to walk a delicate line, with both internal pressure from different House GOP factions and external pressure from former President Trump complicating the calculus of how to address the end-of-month funding deadline. As he grapples with the final legislative hurdle before this year’s leadership races — during which he is hoping to remain Speaker if Republicans win the House — Johnson angering any of them could put him in a bind.
Within the House GOP conference, opposition that forced leaders to scrap plans to vote on the bill last week came from hardline conservatives who were opposed to the use of a stopgap; defense hawks who were concerned about the impact the six-month measure would have at the Pentagon; and moderates who were worried about the threat of a shutdown so close to the election.
Nearly a dozen Republicans had said they would oppose the package ahead of that planned vote.
House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) responded “yeah” when asked Tuesday if he had changed any votes. And Rep. Kevin Hern (R-Okla.), chair of the conservative Republican Study Committee, emerged from a meeting with Johnson saying the Speaker “felt really good about the direction it’s going.”
But at least six Republicans were still opposed to the six-month CR that includes the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, The Hill confirmed: Reps. Thomas Massie (Ky.), Jim Banks (Ind.), Matt Rosendale (Mont.), Greg Steube (Fla.), Cory Mills (Fla.), and Tim Burchett (Tenn.).
In the slim House GOP majority, Republicans can afford to lose four members on a party-line vote before needing the help of Democrats, assuming full attendance. Just one Democrat has indicated he will support the bill: Centrist Rep. Jared Golden of Maine.
Rep. Steve Womack (R-Ark.), an appropriations cardinal, said he assumed Johnson was able to secure more votes for the bill, but speculated that the Speaker “feels like he needs to be able to put something up to demonstrate that we're serious about what we're trying to do, even if it fails.”
Trump, meanwhile, has told Republicans to “CLOSE IT DOWN” and not approve a continuing resolution unless they get “absolute assurances on Election Security.”
There is virtually no appetite, however, for a government shutdown — a dynamic that Rep. Majorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) said shows that Johnson is “leading a fake fight that he has no intention of actually fighting.”
“Speaker Johnson needs to go to the Democrats, who he has worked with the entire time, to get the votes he needs to do what he is already planning to do,” Greene said on X.
Democrats say the six-month timeline and Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act are nonstarters, noting it is already illegal for noncitizens to vote in elections and worrying about placing extra burdens on eligible voters.
The original advocates of the 6-month CR-plus-SAVE Act plan indicated that the voting bill could be a negotiation point with Democrats for other measures.
But many GOP lawmakers expect that the ultimate end point will be a short-term continuing resolution.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) warned against Johnson pursuing the CR-plus-SAVE Act on the Senate floor on Monday: “In order to avoid a shutdown, the worse thing our colleagues in the House can do right now is waste time on proposals that don’t have broad bipartisan support.”
And some Senate Republicans are hoping that Johnson changes course, too.
“There has been a lot of conversation between the House and the Senate on the subject. I hope we can execute on getting something done. My assumption is maybe it’s a shorter rather than a longer [continuing resolution],” Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) said on Monday.