New Speaker grasps for funding plan with shutdown looming
WASHINGTON — With just a week left to avert a government shutdown, new House Speaker Mike Johnson is facing his first big test as he tries to win House Republican support for a short-term funding plan — a task that looks increasingly difficult amid stubborn divisions in the party over federal spending.
Federal agencies are making plans for a shutdown that would shutter government services and halt paychecks for millions of federal workers and military troops.
It’s a disruption that Johnson — just two weeks into his job running the House — has said he wants to avoid. Yet House lawmakers left Wash- ington for the weekend with- out a plan in hand after sev- eral setbacks. Johnson is still sounding out support among Republicans about what to do and is expected to unveil funding legislation over the weekend, according to Repub- licans granted anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.
The shrinking calen- dar gives Johnson, a Loui- siana Republican who has vaulted from the lower ranks of Republican leadership to the speaker’s office, a narrow window to corral an unpre- dictable GOP conference.
“We’re running up against the clock on Nov. 17, and we’re obviously aware of that,” John- son said this week, referring to the date that government funding expires. “But we are going to get the job done.”
Hardline conservatives, usually loathe to support tem- porary spending measures of any sort, had indicated they would give Johnson some leeway to pass legislation, known as a continuing reso- lution, to give Congress more time to negotiate a long-term agreement. Congress passed a 47-day continuing resolu- tion in October, but the fall- out was severe. Kevin McCarthy was booted from the speakership days later, and the House was effectively par- alyzed for most of the month while Republicans tried to elect a replacement.
Republicans eventually were unanimous in electing Johnson speaker, but his ele- vation has hardly eased the dynamic that led to McCar- thy’s removal — a conference torn on policy as well as how much to spend on federal pro- grams. This week, Republi- cans had to pull two spend- ing bills from the floor — one to fund transportation and housing programs and the other to fund the Treasury Department, Small Business Administration and other agencies — because they didn’t have the votes in their own party to push them through the House.
“I thought we were going to show the speaker a little bit of grace,” said a frustrated Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Texas, as he exited the Capitol Thurs- day after the last votes of the week. “I think it’s looking like we’re still confused and we are not united.”
Johnson has turned to House Republicans for ideas on how to win support for a continuing resolution. He has floated the obscure idea of a “laddered” approach that would fund some parts of the government until early December and other federal departments until mid-Jan- uary. He has also raised the idea of a funding package that would last into January.
Meanwhile, lawmakers are still looking for a way to nego- tiate final passage of aid for Israel in its war with Hamas, and Johnson has also proposed the formation of a new federal commission focused on slowing increases in the national debt that threaten the government’s ability in future years to finance the military and major entitlement programs relied on by seniors and the disabled.
Democrats have made it clear they will not support any funding packages that include policy wins for conservatives. Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York, who the Democratic leader in the House, said they would not “pay a single, right-wing ransom demand” as part of a funding resolution.
Democratic lawmakers are also eager to play up the House Republican divisions and to pin any blame for a shutdown squarely on the new speaker and his GOP colleagues.
“They are a divided, divisive, dysfunctional majority,” said Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md. “They can’t get their business done, to the detriment of Americans.”
On the other side of the Capitol, the Democratic-held Senate took procedural steps Thursday that would allow it to take up a continuing resolution in time to avoid a partial shutdown. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said negotiations could evolve in the coming days, but added that a shutdown cannot be avoided without bipartisan cooperation.
“I implore Speaker Johnson and our House Republican colleagues to learn from the fiasco of a month ago: Hard-right proposals, hardright slashing cuts, hard-right poison pills that have zero support from Democrats will only make a shutdown more likely,” Schumer said. “I hope they don’t go down that path in the week to come.”