The decision by House Republicans to write spending bills below the caps established in this month’s bipartisan debt ceiling deal sets the stage for a clash with Democrats in the Senate and White House — and heightens the odds of a government shutdown later in the year.
The debt limit legislation, negotiated between President Biden and Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), featured an agreement to set new top lines on discretionary spending over the next two fiscal years.
Yet McCarthy, under heavy pressure from his right flank, has since balked at those figures, arguing they’re not the target levels but merely represent a spending ceiling Congress cannot surpass. Behind Rep. Kay Granger (R-Texas), chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee, Republicans intend to mark up their 2024 spending bills at lower, 2022 levels, estimated to cut an additional $120 billion in federal outlays.
Those cuts are a non-starter with Democrats, whose support will be needed to pass the appropriations bills into law and prevent a partial government shutdown on Oct. 1.
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The dynamics set Congress on a collision course in September over the size and scope of government spending — a debate complicated by the conservative threat for McCarthy to hold the party line on deficit reduction or face a challenge to his Speakership.
Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), the House minority leader, has said Democrats will oppose anything less than the agreed-upon debt ceiling levels. Rep. Rosa DeLauro (Conn.), senior Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, said the GOP’s strategy “all but guarantees a shutdown.” And Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, delivered a similar warning, saying House Republicans will never win Democratic support for their spending cuts, but they might very well succeed in shuttering the government.
“The Senate is going to mark up to the deal that was made. And so House Republicans are going to completely make themselves irrelevant [and] make their members vote on these deep, deep cuts, and it has no possibility of becoming law,” Aguilar told reporters Tuesday in the Capitol.
The conservative threat to McCarthy’s power, he added, has created a situation where the tail is wagging the dog.
“These are the deals that Kevin McCarthy has to make in order to hold the gavel,” he said.
Muddling the issue is a disagreement between McCarthy and his conservative detractors over the precise nature of the concessions he made in January as he struggled to win their support for his Speakership. The hard-liners maintain McCarthy promised to fight for 2022 spending levels in 2024 and to refuse votes on any proposal above that level.
“That was the agreement in January: that the Speaker would not put legislation on the floor that exceeded 2022 spending levels,” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) said Tuesday.
Yet McCarthy has disputed that account in no uncertain terms.
“We never promised we’re going to be all at ’22 levels. I said we would strive to get to the ’22 level, or the equivalent of that amount in cuts,” the Speaker said earlier in the month as he defended the debt ceiling deal from the conservative critics.
That legislation, dubbed the Financial Responsibility Act (FRA), included an incentive to Congress to pass all 12 regular appropriations bills in a timely manner. If the appropriations are not made by Jan. 1, then any continuing resolution (CR) would have to cap spending at 99 percent of current levels — a 1 percent across-the-board cut that would affect even military spending.
Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) talks to reporters outside of his office on Monday, June 12, 2023.
That threat is already spooking defense hawks, who are warning of the harm to national security in the age of great power competition, particularly with Russia and China. But a growing number of lawmakers appear increasingly resigned that a CR will be necessary, setting up yet another showdown between House Republicans and Senate Democrats.
“My guess is we’ll go ahead and pass the CR at the 99 percent level,” said Rep. Gary Palmer (R-Ala.). “And then if there’s a shutdown, it’ll be the Senate that shuts it down.”
But the Jan. 1 sequester date leaves some uncertainty about what would happen when the new fiscal year starts Oct. 1.
Some members of the House Appropriations Committee were already feeling the time crunch, and they now have even more pressure after Granger’s announcement on spending levels. Now, the House must quickly pass those bills, and the Democratic-controlled Senate — which is sure to reject the House GOP spending levels — will have to act.
“There is a prospect that we could be at an impasse come into September,” said Rep. Steve Womack (R-Ark.), a subcommittee chairman on the House Appropriations.
“This governing majority of ours doesn’t need to be toying around with shutting down the government,” Womack.
McCarthy has also said he will not bring up any omnibus legislation that combines appropriations into one large package, further complicating the timeline. Congress has not passed all 12 regular appropriations bills on time since 1996.
Many hard-line conservatives, for their part, say they’re not threatening to force a government shutdown to get the spending levels they want — at least not yet.
“We’re trying to get on the same team, Republicans, to focus on spending cuts. I don’t think anybody wants a shutdown. I sure don’t,” said Gaetz.
Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-Wash.), a more moderate member of the House Appropriations Committee, called discussion of a shutdown “a little premature.”
Yet others are downplaying the severity of a shutdown, arguing the nation’s soaring debt poses an even greater threat to the nation’s economic well-being.
“I’m not worried about a shutdown,” Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) said. “The country’s going to be permanently shut down if we don’t get our spending under control. And I’m tired of hearing, ‘We’ll do it tomorrow.’
“We’re gonna do it now. Or attempt to.”