House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., canceled a vote Wednesday night on a Senate budget proposal as many Republicans were concerned that proposed spending cuts didn’t go deep enough, and the measure was likely to fail.
Johnson said the chamber would “probably” vote on the measure Thursday, according to The Hill.
“We are working through some good ideas and solutions to get everybody there; it may not happen tonight but probably by tomorrow morning,” Johnson told reporters. “This is part of the process, this is a very constructive process, I’m very optimistic about the outcome of this one big, beautiful bill, and this is just one of the steps in getting there.”
The cancellation is seen as a setback for President Donald Trump, who has spent this week trying to galvanize votes for the fiscal blueprint. He met with conservative holdouts at the White House on Tuesday afternoon and urged Republicans on Truth Social to support the measure.
During the National Republican Congressional Committee’s fundraiser Tuesday night in Washington, D.C., Trump said, “They have to do this. We have to get there. I think we are there. We had a great meeting today. But just in case there are a couple of Republicans out there. You just gotta get there. Close your eyes and get there. It’s a phenomenal bill. Stop grandstanding. Just stop grandstanding.”
Adoption of identical budget resolutions in the House and Senate is an essential step to allowing committees to start drafting and passing a party-line package of tax cuts, military spending, energy policy, and border security investments. The reconciliation package also is needed to prevent a Democrat filibuster in the Senate.
Johnson officially announced plans to yank the vote after he huddled in a room off the House floor with more than a dozen conservatives for more than an hour in a last-minute push to rally his ranks around the legislation, The Hill reported. House GOP leaders kept an unrelated vote open for more than an hour to allow for the talks.
House conservatives were concerned because the legislation directs House committees to find at least $1.5 trillion in spending cuts, while Senate committees are mandated to slash at least $4 billion. Concerned that the final package would end up closer to the Senate number than the House, conservatives dug in.
“$4 billion in cuts over 10 years is a joke,” Rep. Eric Burlison, R-Mo., posted earlier Wednesday on X. “House Republicans already passed $2 TRILLION in real cuts. We can support President Trump and fight for fiscal sanity.”
Rep. Kevin Hern, R-Okla., told Politico earlier this week, “We just don’t trust the Senate. It just seems very unserious that they want to control the deficits in this country.”
Rep. Andy Harris, R-Md., chair of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, reportedly said Tuesday he declined an invitation to speak with Trump because he didn’t think he could be convinced to support the budget framework.
“There’s nothing that I can hear at the White House that I don’t understand about the situation,” Harris said.
Newsmax reached out to the White House for comment.
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