REPUBLICANS FACE DANGEROUS START
Buckle up. The next 100 days in Washington will be tumultuous.
Donald Trump and leading Republicans plan to overwhelm the 115th Congress, which convened Tuesday, with a mind-numbing array of changes. By the end of April, they hope to have confirmed a new Supreme Court justice, cleared a huge infrastructure measure, and be well on the way to enacting big and permanent tax cuts along with sharp cutbacks in spending on domestic programs aff cting the poor. They may throw in some education reform and immigration crackdowns.
On his first day in office, Trump is expected to issue sweeping executive orders that undo many of the actions taken by President Barack Obama on issues such as the environment and immigration.
That’s just the formal agenda. Trump, who already has weighed in more than any other president-elect in recent memory — with tweets praising Vladimir Putin or changing nuclear policy — predictably will create new controversies on his own.
Congress is preparing for this enormous workload. Abandoning the leisurely schedule of recent years, lawmakers are slating four or five day workweeks for the next three months, except for a week off in February.
Despite the Republicans’ total control there are possible fissures that could create complications. Trump’s priority is to quickly enact the biggest infrastructure measure since the Interstate Highway System. That could get support from Democrats if it doesn’t include anti-union provisions and isn’t funded by cutting other programs. Trump wouldn’t care if it blows a big hole in the deficit, though that would be a problem for many conservative Republicans.
Congressional Republicans say Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence claim they’ll essentially delegate the substantive agenda to House Speaker Paul Ryan and other leaders on Capitol Hill, though the president-elect already has had several screaming phone calls with top Republican members of Congress.