By Lisa Mascaro and Kevin Freking, Associated Press
Washington (AP) – After suddenly interrupting the votes, the president of the Mike Johnson room promised to try again on Thursday to approve a republican budgetary framework, having worked in the night to satisfy the selected of the GOP which refused to advance billions of dollars of tax reminders without deeper discounts.
Even a strong push by President Donald Trump could not raise the package to approval. Johnson was forced to abandon the planned action on Wednesday when the Republican Hardliners left it without sufficient support, and risked upsetting what the president calls the “major bill”, which is at the heart of his program of tax reductions, mass deportations and a smaller federal government.
“The president is very impatient that we do it,” said Johnson, R-La. He said he expects votes on Thursday.
Pushing the budgetary framework forward would record another important step for Johnson, who can only lose some detractors of his thin majority. A failed vote, especially since the economy was convulsed in Trump’s trade wars, would be a major setback for the republican agenda in Washington.
“Stop in greatness!” Trump had urged the Republicans at a black tie fundraising dinner at the National Building Museum earlier during the week.
Trump told Republicans: “Close your eyes and get there.”
But Wednesday afternoon, the result was in mass. At least a dozen conservative republicans, if not more, stood firmly against the plan. Several of them, including members of the ultra -conservative Freedom Caucus, have made the unusual step to walk through the Capitol to meet in private the leaders of the GOP of the Senate to insist on deeper cuts.
As night fell, Johnson pulled a group of Republicans in a private meeting room when the room procedures stopped. They stayed in the night by haunting alternatives.
Johnson said he spoke with Trump for about five minutes while the GOP meeting took place. The GOP speaker said they were trying to understand the minimum number of cuts and savings “that will satisfy everyone”.
The options include the modification of the Senate bill or the fact that a conference committee draws up the differences, among others. “There are some different ideas on the table,” said Johnson.
“We want everyone to have a high degree of comfort on what is happening here, and we have a small subset of members who were not completely satisfied with the product as it is,” said Johnson.
But the conservatives of the GOP of the Chamber, including many of those who personally met Trump in the White House this week, remained concerned that the GOP Senate plan, approved last weekend, did not reduce expenses to the level they deem necessary to help prevent the deficits.
“Mathematics are not added,” published the representative Chip Roy, R-Texas on social networks. He said he wouldn’t support him.
Representative Andy Harris, R-MD., President of Freedom Caucus, led other people to meet the leader of the majority of the Senate John Thune, Rs.d., and to other Republicans of the Senate.
“All we can do is make sure they understand where we come from and how much we want to work with them to access the final product,” said Thune afterwards.
But the leader of the GOP of the Senate developed the idea that the room returns a modified version, which would require another voting session all night potential like the senators endured last weekend. “We cannot do this-another voting-a-rama, which drags it indefinitely,” said Thune.
The Chamber and the Senate are always in the start phase of a process that will take weeks, even months, because they transform their budgetary resolutions into legislative text – a final product with more votes later in the spring or summer.
The Democrats, in the minority, do not have enough votes to stop the package, but warned against this.
The Democratic Leader of the Hakeem Jeffries Chamber of New York said that the Budget Plan of the Republicans was reckless and insensitive because it proposes to reduce budgets to give tax alleviation to the rich.
“We are here to specify,” said Jeffries. “Everyday Americans who find it difficult to reach both ends.”
At the heart of the budgetary framework is the republican effort to preserve approved tax reductions in 2017, during Trump’s first term, while adding the new ones he promised on the campaign campaign. This does not include any tax on wages, social security income and others, raising the price to some 7 billions of dollars during the decade.
The package also allows budgetary increases with some $ 175 billion to pay Trump’s mass deportation operations and for the Ministry of Defense to strengthen military spending.
Everything would be partially paid with steep cuts to domestic programs, including health care, as part of the 2 dollars of discounts described in the GOP version of the Package Chamber, although several GOP senators have reported that they are not willing to go so far.
To extract the costs, the Senate uses an unusual accounting method which does not have the costs of preserving tax reductions of 2017, $ 4.5 billions of dollars, as new expenses, another factor which is in the process of enraging the conservatives of the room.
Two republican senators voted against their package during a night weekend session – Maine Susan Collins senator opposed steep discounts in Medicaid as part of the room, while Kentucky Rand Paul Senator argued that the entire package was based on “fish” mathematics that would add to debt.
The package would also increase the country’s debt limit to allow more loans to pay the bills. Trump wanted the legislators to withdraw the politically difficult issue of the table. With a debt now at 36 billions of dollars, the Treasury Department said that there would be a shortage of funds by August.
But the room and the Senate must also resolve their differences on the limit of the debt. The GOP of the Chamber increases the limit of debt by 4 dollars of dollars, but the GOP of the Senate increased it to 5 billions of dollars, the congress would therefore have to review the question until the election in mid-term 2026.
With Trump’s trade wars on the debate, the House Republicans have slipped a provision in a procedural vote which would prevent measures in the House – as the Senate took – to disapprove of Trump’s prices.
The writers of the Associated Press Mary Clare Jalonick, Stephen Groves, Leah Askarinam and Matt Brown contributed to this report.
Originally published:
California Daily Newspapers
