House Republican leaders are considering canceling votes next week as they face an uphill battle on the remaining fiscal 2025 appropriations bills, sources familiar with the discussions say.
No final decision has been made, and several sources said it remains possible that leadership tries to pass more spending bills or other measures next week. But with no breakthrough on controversial appropriations measures in sight, leadership may be making the dreams of some lawmakers and aides come true with an extra week of August recess.
The House is set to take up two spending bills this week: Energy-Water and Interior-Environment. The Rules Committee is meeting Monday afternoon to consider which amendments members will be allowed to offer. If the House can pass those two, it will have passed half of the dozen annual appropriations bills, worth nearly 75 percent of next year’s total $1.6 trillion funding allotment.
But the remaining six bills — Agriculture, Commerce-Justice-Science, Financial Services, Legislative Branch, Labor-HHS-Education and Transportation-HUD — all have provisions that make them difficult to pass. Republicans were already unsuccessful in their attempt to pass the Legislative Branch bill earlier this month.
The Agriculture and Financial Services bills were set to hit the floor this week. But conservative concerns that the Agriculture spending levels were too high and moderate worries over an abortion-related provision in the Financial Services bill muddied the chances of passage of those two bills.
A busy schedule this week also played a role in those two bills getting punted. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to address a joint meeting of Congress on Wednesday, and Biden administration officials will be appearing at a series of security-related hearings following the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump. The House is out on Friday.
An extra week of recess will also allow members more time to campaign after the major shake-up in the presidential race, with President Joe Biden announcing Sunday that he will no longer seek reelection. Vice President Kamala Harris has emerged as the Democratic front-runner with Biden’s endorsement, and members are anxious to lock down the nomination process ahead of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago next month.
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