The Citrus Peel

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Although the Trump Administration is well underway pushing through the Trump agenda with executive orders, Republicans in the US House and Senate are still battling bitter disagreements in attempt to pass one budget through both chambers of congress. Through an all-night Vote-A-Rama on February 21st, the Senate narrowly passed a budget resolution primarily focused on spending for immigration enforcement, energy, and the military, with plans to pass another resolution in the future over taxes. Similarly, the GOP controlled House of Representatives passed their resolution by two votes on February 25th, which would tackle the entire budget in one go.

Both resolutions are each chamber’s solution to creating provisions for Trump’s immigration enforcement plans, energy policies, cuts to the federal deficit, and expansion of tax cuts. Yet, each resolution did not come easily. Both bills passed by a slim majority, with Republicans and Democrats alike balking at both resolutions.

The Senate’s Two-Part Plan

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On the 21st of February, the US Senate engaged in an all-night Vote-A-Rama, a process where amendments to a resolution are proposed and voted on in quick succession until the resolution is passed. This came as an effort to pass the Senate’s budget resolution which would create provisions for immigration enforcement, energy, and the military, the first of their two-part approach to creating a budget that would lay the groundwork for implementation of the Trump administration’s agenda. The $340 billion budget package comes as Trump ramps up border patrols and deportations, with Lindsay Graham, R-S.C., telling reporters that Tom Homan, Trump’s Border Czar, has said that the administrations deportation operations are, “out of money.”

The 10-hour Vote-A-Rama offered Democrats, who are otherwise limited in their ability to propose legislation in the Republican controlled Senate, an opportunity to propose amendments to the resolution to be voted on and propose they did. When all was said and done, 33 amendments were proposed and voted on, including amendments to reverse DOGE cuts, protect federal workers, and ensure continued support to Ukraine.

Democrats proposed several amendments aimed at protecting social programs like Medicaid, which many Democrats in the House and Senate claim is threatened by both resolutions. One Republican, Susie Collins from Maine, voted in favor of several amendments to preserve Medicaid. One amendment, a proposal to prohibit cutting taxes for the wealthy if even $1 was cut from Medicaid, was supported by both Susie Collins, R-Maine, and Josh Hawley, R-Mo., but was ultimately voted down 49-51.

In the end, only two amendments passed, one of which was proposed by Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, and would create “a deficit neutral reserve fund relating to protecting Medicare and Medicaid.” This amendment, an effort by Republicans to fend off attacks claiming that millions would lose their Medicaid coverage, was not without contention, with Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore. saying, “The language in this amendment is code for kicking Americans with Medicaid coverage off their health insurance if they’re not sick enough, not poor enough, or not disabled enough.”

The overall package seeks $175 billion for immigration and border enforcement and an expansion of the military budget of $150 billion, and it directs committees to find the cuts to pay for these measures. Furthermore, it would add more than $300 billion to the federal deficit, which was a source of contention from Senator Rand Paul, R-Ky., the lone Republican to join democrats in opposing the bill. But while this is only part one of a two-part plan which would include another resolution aimed at providing for Trump’s promised tax cuts, the House has been hard at work on what Trump called, “ONE BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL” on Truth Social.

The House’s Big, Beautiful Bill

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While the Senate has taken a two-part approach to passing a budget that will lay the groundwork for the Trump administration’s ambitious agenda, Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, claims the House’s one bill approach has a better chance at reconciliation. Johnson said in a press conference held on the 25th of February ahead of the vote that evening, “This has been necessary because we promised to deliver President Trump’s full agenda, not just a part of it. We’re not just going to do a little bit now and return later for the rest. We have to do it now.” The bill, which included provisions for Trump’s tax cuts and immigration enforcement, was contentious, and there were several Republican holdouts right up until the vote, primarily due to the claims that the bill will result in cuts to Medicaid.

The vote almost didn’t happen, and due to Republican holdouts like Rep. Warren Davidson of Ohio, Victoria Spartz of Indiana and Tim Burchett of Tennessee, the vote was initially called off Tuesday night before Johnson called it back into place as Representatives were filing out of the House floor. In the end, the resolution passed 217-215, with only one Republican, Thomas Massie of Kentucky, voting against it, but why all the contention in the first place?

The primary source of controversy over the House resolution comes from two things: cuts to Medicaid, which insures over 70 million Americans, and increases to the federal deficit. The bill proposes $4.5 trillion in tax cuts over the next ten years, which would lay the foundation for extended the Tax Cut and Jobs Act, the Trump era tax cut which is set to expire at the end of this year, and $2 Trillion in spending cuts. Overall, one conservative estimation calculates that the bill will add at least $2.8 Trillion to the federal deficit over the course of ten years.

The bill directs the following committees to find the $2 Trillion in cuts:

• At least $880 billion by the Energy and Commerce Committee 
• At least $330 billion by the Education and Workforce Committee 
• At least $230 billion by the Agriculture Committee
• At least $50 billion by the Oversight and Government Reform Committee
• At least $10 billion by the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee
• At least $1 billion by the Financial Services Committee
• At least $1 billion by the Natural Resources Committee

Democrats homed in on the $880 billion dollars in cuts to the Energy and Commerce Committee, which oversees Medicaid spending. Representative Brenden Boyle of Pennsylvania, top Democrat on the Budget Committee stated, “It has to come from Medicaid, it has to come from the A.C.A. premiums, because that’s the only place you can find $880 billion.” Meanwhile, Rep. Victoria Spartz, R-Ind., an initial Republican holdout who ultimately voted for the resolution, said she did so because Trump gave her a personal commitment to, “save health care and make it better.”

The bill does include an amendment intended appease fiscal hawks that says that if congress does not find $2 Trillion in spending cuts, it must cut the difference from the $4.5 Trillion in tax cuts, but if it finds more than $2 Trillion in spending cuts, the surplus will be added to the tax cuts.

Reconciliation

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Republicans are hoping to use a maneuver in the House and Senate called reconciliation in order to avoid achieving the 60-vote majority in the Senate and 218 vote in the House, which would require winning over Democratic congress members. Reconciliation, a tool used in the budget process by both Republican and Democrat controlled congresses of the past, is a process which would require three things. 1) The House and Senate must pass one budget resolution directing committees in congress to appropriate or slash funds. 2) Congressional committees must agree on and pass legislation out of committee which is then put into one big bill by the Budget Committee. 3) This bill must be able to pass with a simple majority through the House and Senate.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and John Thune, R-S.D., met Wednesday at the White House, along with the leaders of the tax-writing committees, House Ways & Means Committee Chair Jason Smith, R-Mo., and Senate Finance Committee Chair Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, to discuss reconciliation. While Johnson called it a, “great meeting”, and Thune said the meeting included, “good conversations”, the consensus seems to be that Republicans have their work cut out for them.

Republican Senator John Kennedy from Louisiana said when asked if the Senate should take the House budget unchanged, “Short answer is likely no. Long answer is, hell no.” Meanwhile, when Speaker Johnson was asked how much change the House can stomach to their bill, he said, “As little as possible.” It comes as no surprise that the Senate, which was weary of a bill that would add $300 billion to the federal deficit would balk at a bill that would possibly add $2.8 trillion.

Of course, it’s no help that this comes as the temporary budget that congress is operating under expires on March 14th. This means that Republicans will need to pass another stop gap budget bill with Democratic support before then to avoid a government shut down and provide them with time for the lengthy reconciliation process.

The Budget and Priorities

As with many of the other issues I’ve reviewed in the Trump Budget Series, the House and Senate’s budget resolutions paint a clear picture of priorities under the Trump administration and Republican controlled congress. These bills prioritize immigration enforcement and defense spending while slashing the budgets of committees which control things like Medicaid, education, the federal workforce, and infrastructure. Furthermore, although the Senate has not proposed its solution to Trump’s proposal to extend and bolster tax cuts, the House clearly plans on keeping and expanding the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which, as you can read about in The Trump Tax, primarily benefits the wealthiest of Americans while increasing the federal deficit and causing cuts to programs that benefit working and middle class citizens.

It will definitely be interesting to see how the new reconciliation bill takes shape, and where spending cuts ultimately come from in order to make up for the enormous tax cuts the House has proposed. Stay tuned as I track developments with this and other issues in my Trump Budget Series, which you can check here.