GOP has far to go to reach big goals
Infighting key in agenda’s holdup
WASHINGTON — Congress is on track to deliver President Donald Trump his first big bipartisan agreement this week with a $1 trillion spending bill to keep the government running, but other major legislative accomplishments don’t seem likely anytime soon.
Even though Republicans control the House, Senate and White House, the party in power is now at risk of squandering the unique opportunity offered in an administration’s early months to muscle through big-ticket priorities in Congress.
House Speaker Paul Ryan once promised a Republican agenda so ambitious — repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, overhaul the tax code, cut federal regulations — that it would take twice the traditional 100 days of the new administration to accomplish it.
But as Congress continues the march toward Ryan’s 200-day milestone, the prospect for success on almost any of the major Republican priorities is no more in sight than during the first 100 days, which left Trump with only a slim list of achievements.
“It’s really hard to do big stuff, especially when the White House is unpopular,” said George Washington University professor Sarah Binder, an expert on Congress.
This week will be pivotal as Congress is set to approve the spending package that averts a shutdown threat by funding government operations through September.
House Republicans may also try again to bring their Obamacare overhaul bill to the floor after earlier attempts fizzled. But it’s unclear whether they have support from their own members, and the bill has almost no chance in the Senate because Republicans there oppose it.
The combination of Republican infighting, the White House’s failure to provide clear direction and an extensive, complicated agenda have hobbled the majority’s ability to accomplish its goals.
With the health care effort headed for defeat in the Senate and tax reform still likely months away from being crafted into legislation, congressional Republicans have teed up few other promised priorities, such as infrastructure or border security. It raises questions of what, if anything, Congress can accomplish before the summer recess.
Congress has sent more than 28 bills to the president to sign into law. Most were modest measures or bills passed under a special process to unwind recent Obamaera regulations.
The spending package is likely to win backing from a wide crosssection of lawmakers, in part because it steered clear of Trump’s top priorities — money for the proposed wall at the border with Mexico and steep cuts in non-defense programs. It beefs up military spending that both parties support, but only by half as much as the administration wanted.
Congress will likely finish the week having averted a shutdown — usually seen as the basics of governing — only because Republicans in this case were forced to drop their go-it-alone approach.
“I hope this is a metaphor for the future,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Monday. “If Republicans work with us, we can get things done.”
The first six months of a new Congress are typically prime time for legislating, even more so when the majority party also has its president in the White House.
But the flaw in the GOP strategy has been an inability to unify as a working majority amid constant dissent between its conservative and centrist factions. That friction helped stall the health care bill and could hinder tax overhaul negotiations.
“It’s been a total swing and a miss — several swings and misses,” said Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.
Rep. Dave Brat, R-Va., a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, acknowledged that Republicans should have been better prepared for this moment.
But he remained hopeful that Trump, with his convention-breaking style, will buy more time for Congress to act.
“Under the old-style thing, you should have had it all ready to go,” Brat said. “But you got to fit it in the Trump matrix.”
At some point, Republican leaders in Congress will bear responsibility for its accomplishments, or lack of them. House Democratic leader Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s office quipped last week that running the country doesn’t come with “training wheels.”
Many Republicans simply did not expect Trump to win the presidency and did not prepare for a legislative agenda beyond loose policy papers and blueprints.
Republicans are likely to set their sights lower, on smaller legislative lifts in the weeks to come, if the big-ticket items slip beyond reach.