Finishing appropriations, mainstreaming delays, and mulling presidential rematches

Friday, March 22, 2024

In this week's newsletter: Appropriations, 2024 Election

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Avoiding a shutdown, a shrinking GOP majority in the House and (maybe) another motion to vacate

It has been one of those days on Capitol Hill, with Congress eyeing the start of a two-week recess and the House passing a $1.2 trillion, 1,012-page “minibus” of the six remaining appropriations bills for 2024. Whether the Senate can follow suit before midnight, avoiding a partial government shutdown this weekend, is an open question. Hardline House Republicans are steaming about spending writ large and some particular items. But House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) once again prioritized avoiding a shutdown over pressing for everything hardliners wanted as he negotiated spending with Democrats. Republicans can tout the more than $490 million they secured for 22,000 additional Border Patrol agents, an IRS funding freeze, and limited increases for a host of other agencies. Democrats can boast about a $1.2 billion TSA increase, a $1 billion boost for child care, and $55 million for election security grants. Depending on what transpires in the Senate tonight, this bill would avert a shutdown and keep the federal government running for another six months. Delays in passing a budget are no way to run the federal government, which is why we remain committed to working with all parties to return to regular order. Even more drama unfolded today when Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) announced she is filing a motion to “vacate the chair” of Speaker Johnson, the same measure that forced former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) from the job last fall. A few hours later, Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-MI) announced he’s leaving Congress on April 19.? It’s also Rep. Ken Buck’s (R-CO) final day in the House, leaving the Republican majority hanging by a thread.

Better late than never — but later and later

Do you think it’s a little late – nearly six months after the October 1 start of fiscal year 2024 – for lawmakers to wrap up appropriations bills? Perhaps, but such tardiness is becoming far more common. Over the last 15 years, they’ve worked into December seven times, January once, February once, March four times, April once, and May once. Looking back further in history doesn’t prove any more inspiring. Since Congress implemented the current budget process in the mid-1970s, lawmakers have enacted all appropriations bills by October 1 just four times : 1977, 1989, 1995. and 1997. And since 1997, they’ve never finished more than five of them on time. The later they finish in a fiscal year, the more that year overlaps with the next one, further complicating matters.

Biden-Trump II: an historical perspective?

Would a Biden-Trump rematch be a highly unusual U.S. historical event? Not really, says Tevi Troy , a BPC senior fellow and head of BPC’s Presidential Leadership Initiative. This week on “The Briefing,” BPC’s co-branded show on SiriusXM (Channel 124), Troy said we’ve had six rematches of presidential candidates – starting with John Adams and Thomas Jefferson in 1800 and ending (so far) with Dwight Eisenhower and Adlai Stevenson in 1956. Grover Cleveland is the only president to win back his office (in 1892) and, Troy tells us , his return came as no surprise to his wife, Frances. Take care of the furniture, she told the White House staff upon departing after Cleveland’s first term. “We are coming back just four years from today.”