02/06/2025

House Budget Committee Hits Roadblock on Reconciliation

Spending scale reduction disagreements have stalled progress

House Republicans’ plans to advance a comprehensive budget resolution this week have hit a snag, delaying a key step in their push to enact President Trump’s policy agenda.

The House Budget Committee was expected to mark up the resolution to set the stage for budget reconciliation, but GOP leadership has confirmed that the process will not move forward as planned.

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) had laid out an ambitious legislative schedule, aiming for the House to approve the budget resolution by mid-February. That timeline is now uncertain as internal divisions within the Republican caucus persist.

At the heart of the delay is an ongoing debate over spending cuts.

• In January, House Budget Committee Republicans circulated a 51-page document outlining potential policy changes and cost estimates for a reconciliation package spanning 11 committees.
• The proposal was intended to identify revenue sources to offset significant tax cuts and other legislative priorities.

However, disagreements over the scale of spending reductions have stalled progress.

• Initially, House GOP leaders proposed $500 billion in spending cuts, a figure that met immediate resistance from fiscal hardliners.
• In an attempt to bridge the gap, leaders raised the proposed cuts to $700 billion, but that still fell short of demands from members of the House Freedom Caucus and other deficit hawks.
• Some conservatives are calling for at least $2 trillion in spending reductions, a level that leadership has so far resisted.

What's next: The reconciliation package is expected to address a broad range of policy areas, including tax cuts, federal spending, immigration, and energy. A major point of contention is the extension of the 2017 tax cuts, which, according to the Congressional Budget Office, would add $4.6 trillion to the national deficit over the next decade.

House leaders are expected to continue negotiations in Washington this week.

This article was provided to OSAP by ASAE's Power of Associations and Inroads.