Take three: Congress is scrambling to place collectively a satisfactory spending deal that may keep away from a authorities shutdown for the third time this week after the Home resoundingly rejected a compromise persevering with decision labored out by President-elect Donald Trump and Home Speaker Mike Johnson (R–La.).
In a Thursday afternoon tally, representatives voted 174-235 in opposition to the Johnson-Trump compromise measure that might have saved the federal government open by way of March, spent one other $100 billion on catastrophe reduction, and raised the debt ceiling (which the federal authorities is presently projected to hit in June 2025) for 2 years.
This second spending deal was provided as an alternative choice to the primary persevering with decision Johnson had labored out with Democrats. That deal additionally would have saved the federal government open till March, spent an extra $100 billion on catastrophe reduction, and enacted a bunch of one-off unrelated insurance policies about funding in China, regulation of pharmacy profit managers, and soccer stadiums in D.C.
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Conservative Republicans balked at that deal for giving far an excessive amount of away to Democrats. Billionaire Elon Musk went on a social media tirade in opposition to the laws. Ultimately, Trump got here out in opposition to it as effectively, successfully killing it.
This second Trump-Johnson deal fared even worse. It misplaced the help of all Democrats whereas failing to internet the help of dozens of Republican fiscal hawks who objected to needlessly elevating the debt ceiling with none offsetting spending cuts.
“My place is easy—I’m not going to lift or droop the debt ceiling (racking up extra debt) with out vital & actual spending cuts hooked up to it,” mentioned Rep. Chip Roy (R–Texas).
My place is easy – I’m not going to lift or droop the debt ceiling (racking up extra debt) with out vital & actual spending cuts hooked up to it. I have been negotiating to that finish. No apologies. CC: @realDonaldTrump @SpeakerJohnson @SenJohnThune @freedomcaucus
— Chip Roy (@chiproytx) December 19, 2024
If Congress passes nothing, the federal authorities will shut down at midnight tonight. Reuters experiences that Johnson is insisting that Congress will handle to keep away from a shutdown, saying “we are going to give you one other resolution.” However he did not supply particulars on what that resolution will probably be.
Speaker Elon: Just a few fiscal hawks in Congress are so pissed off with how this course of has performed out that they are now suggesting a radical change in administration. They need Home Speaker Elon Musk.
Sen. Rand Paul (R–Ky.) first raised this concept yesterday morning in a tweet, suggesting that making Musk speaker could be simply the factor we might must disrupt the “uniparty.”
The Speaker of the Home needn’t be a member of Congress . . .
Nothing would disrupt the swamp greater than electing Elon Musk . . . give it some thought . . . nothing’s not possible. (to not point out the enjoyment at seeing the collective institution, aka ‘uniparty,’ lose their ever-lovin’…
— Rand Paul (@RandPaul) December 19, 2024
Sen. Mike Lee (R–Utah) urged that both Musk or Vivek Ramaswamy, co-leads of the advisory Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE), would make a worthy substitute for Johnson.
Lee: I do not assume the speaker goes to stay in energy.. We’d like daring new management, outdoors management and I feel it must be a doge speaker. Must be both Vivek Ramaswamy or Elon Musk. pic.twitter.com/W7TrN0Ptjq
— Acyn (@Acyn) December 20, 2024
Over at The Dispatch, Nick Catoggio catalogs how Republican lawmakers, even when they are not nominating Musk for speaker, are nonetheless crediting him with blowing up Johnson’s first spending deal.
What’s exceptional about that, notes Catoggio, is that Musk moved not simply Congress however Trump himself. The president-elect was reportedly positive with Johnson’s preliminary spending plan till the world’s richest man began posting incessantly about how a lot it sucked.
“If I am not mistaken, that is the primary time since Trump took over the [Republican] get together that another populist has managed to impose his will on it,” he writes.
Catoggio is fairly gloomy about this growth, and never with out purpose. Authorities by billionaire social media posting is not very best.
Nonetheless, the strain created by Musk and Trump’s twin affect on the GOP may show productive.
Republicans have been so obsequious to Trump for thus lengthy that the introduction of a second charismatic determine in addition they really feel the necessity to placate offers some stability if nothing else.
If a tweetstorm from Elon Musk or Donald Trump might get anybody finances deal killed, maybe Congress must decelerate, construct consensus, and truly legislate out within the open to get issues handed.
Certainly, whereas Trump has made his peace with deficit-busting spending, Musk does appear to have not less than some curiosity in shrinking the dimensions and scope of presidency. Is it too optimistic to count on that his rising affect will push the subsequent Republican Congress to rein in spending?
Debt roofs and ceilings: Most likely, that’s too optimistic, provided that Musk has additionally come out in help of the second Trump-Johnson spending deal that retained all the additional catastrophe spending from the primary invoice and needlessly lifted the debt ceiling for 2 years.
To start with, I am not the writer of this proposal. Credit score to @realDonaldTrump, @JDVance & @SpeakerJohnson.
Second, it is a MUCH higher invoice that’s nearer to being an actual persevering with decision (not an omnibus masquerading as a CR), however with help for hurricane victims &… https://t.co/AJTI6BTFdr
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 19, 2024
Nationwide Evaluation‘s Dominic Pino writes that whereas the debt ceiling is an arbitrary restrict, the truth that it periodically forces Congress to behave to forestall default on the debt opens up alternatives for spending cuts and different reforms. The occasional deficit-reducing payments Congress has handed previously few a long time have all typically been the product of negotiations about elevating the debt restrict.
If Trump, Musk, Johnson, and the majority of Republican lawmakers are all OK with mountain climbing the debt ceiling with none offsetting spending cuts, that doesn’t bode effectively for deficit discount within the incoming Republican Congress.
Scenes from D.C.: The town’s eating places and bars are losing no time in making the most of the looming fiscal chaos. Native meals reporter Jessica Sidman experiences that companies are already rolling out their shutdown specials.
Issues aren’t wanting good when DC eating places are preemptively sending out shutdown specials. pic.twitter.com/pFtFiGJML5
— Jessica Sidman (@jsidman) December 19, 2024
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- President Joe Biden (bear in mind him?) provides further pupil debt reduction.
- Russia launches an enormous missile strike against Kyiv.
- Unhappy:
This meme is being shared round on Home Democrats’ textual content chains, per a Home Democrat: pic.twitter.com/7QmWImbwQ3
— Andrew Solender (@AndrewSolender) December 20, 2024
