WASHINGTON — House Republicans narrowly passed their proposed budget on Thursday, marking a significant shift in direction following efforts by Speaker Mike Johnson to address concerns from some GOP members who were hesitant to support substantial tax cuts without more significant reductions in government spending.
Speaker Johnson, alongside Senate Majority Leader John Thune, worked late into the night at the Capitol to solidify support for President Donald Trump’s proposed budget, aiming to achieve cuts of at least $1.5 trillion in various federal programs and services. This decision came after voting was abruptly paused the previous night.
“I told you not to doubt us,” Johnson, R-La., said afterward.
The House narrowly approved the framework for Trump’s big agenda bill after intense wrangling wins over Republican holdouts.
He acknowledged the week’s economic turmoil with the financial markets “a little unstable,” but said the House vote was a “big day.”
With a vote of 216-214, the budget proposal moved forward as a significant achievement for Speaker Johnson, representing progress in the President’s agenda including tax cuts, immigration policies, and a smaller federal government. A failure to pass the budget, especially amidst economic uncertainties due to trade tensions, would have posed a major setback for the ruling party in Washington. Two conservative Republicans and all Democrats voted against the proposal.
Trump, at a black-tie fundraising dinner this week, had admonished Republicans to “stop grandstanding” on the budget.
By Thursday morning, Trump had shifted his tone.
“Biggest Tax Cuts in USA History!!! Getting close,” Trump said.
The House action still leaves weeks, if not months, ahead, on a final product, with more votes in Congress. Johnson could lose only a few detractors from his slim Republican majority. Democrats, in the minority, lack the votes to stop the package, but they promised to fight every step of the way.
House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York said the GOP budget plan was a “toxic scheme” that proposed the largest cuts to the Medicaid health care program and food assistance in the nation’s history – “all in service of enacting massive tax breaks to their millionaire donors, like Elon Musk.” The businessman is leading Trump’s cost-cutting efforts through the Department of Government Efficiency.
Jeffries said Democrats will push back until they “bury this budget resolution in the ground.”
But late Wednesday, the outcome was in flux. At least a dozen conservative Republicans, if not more, were firmly against the plan. Several of them, including members of the ultraconservative Freedom Caucus, made the unusual move of walking across the Capitol to meet privately with Senate GOP leaders to insist on deeper cuts.
As night fell, Johnson pulled a group of Republicans into a private meeting room as House proceedings came to a standstill. They stayed into the night hashing out alternatives, and were back at it in the morning.
Johnson said he spoke with Trump for about five minutes while the GOP meeting was taking place.
“The president is very anxious for us to get this done,” Johnson said.
But House GOP conservatives, including several of those who met with Trump this week, were concerned that the Senate GOP’s blueprint, approved last weekend, did not cut spending to the level they believe necessary to help prevent soaring deficits.
“The Math Does Not Add Up,” Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, had posted earlier on social media.
Rep. Andy Harris, R-Md., the Freedom Caucus chair, led others to meet with the senators.
In the end, Harris, Roy and almost all the holdouts came on board. They said they were assured by Johnson, Thune and Trump that there would be steep cuts ahead. Republican Reps. Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Rep. Victoria Spartz of Indiana voted “no.”
“We got as much as we could,” said Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn. “We realized it was bigger than us.”
Before the vote, Thune, R-S.D., tried to assure House conservatives that many GOP senators were aligned with their pursuit of spending reductions.
“We certainly are going to do everything we can,” Thune said.
But the details ahead will matter. Key Republican senators already signaled their disapproval of some $800 billion in House-proposed cuts that could hit Medicaid and other vital programs.
Johnson insisted that the health care and other services that millions of Americans rely on, particularly Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, would be spared. Republicans instead are seeking to impose new restrictions on benefits and cut what they portray as waste, fraud and abuse, following DOGE’s efforts.
The House and Senate are at the beginning phase of a process as they turn their budget resolutions into legislative text – a final product expected later this spring or summer.
Central to the budget framework is the Republican effort to preserve the tax breaks approved in 2017, during Trump’s first term, while potentially adding the new ones he promised during his 2024 campaign. That includes no taxes on tipped wages, Social Security income and others, ballooning the price tag to some $7 trillion over the decade.
The package also allows for more than $500 billion in budget increases, including some $175 billion to pay for Trump’s deportation operation and as much for the Defense Department to bolster military spending.
The plan would also raise the nation’s debt limit to allow more borrowing to pay the bills. Trump had wanted lawmakers to take the politically difficult issue off the table. With debt now at $36 trillion, the Treasury Department has said it will run out of funds by August.
But the House and Senate need to resolve their differences on the debt limit, as well. The House GOP increases the debt limit to $4 trillion, but the Senate lifted it to $5 trillion so Congress would not have to revisit the issue again until after the midterm elections in November 2026.
To clip costs, the Senate is using an unusual accounting method that does not count the costs of preserving the 2017 tax cuts, some $4.5 trillion, as new spending, another factor that is enraging the House conservatives.
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Associated Press writers Mary Clare Jalonick, Stephen Groves, Leah Askarinam and Matt Brown contributed to this report.
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