Panel must now combine bills

Sweeping new tax rules passed by the Senate early Saturday will take effect in the 2018 tax year, assuming House and Senate Republicans can hammer out their differences and send a compromise bill to the president for his signature.

Legislators will hash out their differences in a conference committee, an ad-hoc group of senators and representatives tasked with resolving the details when Senate and House bills don’t match.

House Speaker Paul Ryan stayed up into the early hours of Saturday so that, moments after the Senate bill passed, he could tweet his intentions. “Now we will move quickly to a conference committee so that we can get a final bill to President Trump’s desk,” he posted.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell plans to name his conferees in the coming days, his spokesman said.

“The bills are not all that different,” McConnell said. “We tried to move ours somewhat in the House direction.”

Both houses must pass a bill in identical form before the president can sign it.

Operating largely behind closed doors, the conference committee has free rein to tinker with a bill that must then pass muster with the House and the Senate as a whole.

Democrats will be appointed to the panel, but typically members of the majority party call the shots.