With the confirmation that Republicans have won a majority in the House of Representatives, Donald Trump and his party will have a government trifecta in Washington in January, putting the new president in a powerful position to implement his right-wing agenda.
Even without majorities in both houses of Congress, Trump’s victory in the presidential race already gave him significant control over U.S. foreign policy and the composition of the federal government, both of which he is seeking to overhaul.
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But a Republican trifecta in Washington will give Trump far more powers to implement his legislative priorities. As the Guardian detailed in the Stakes Project, Trump’s plans include expanding tax cuts, rolling back landmark laws signed by Joe Biden and advancing a conservative cultural agenda.
One of Republicans’ most frequently repeated campaign promises is that they will extend the tax cuts that Trump signed in 2017. A large part of this will expire at the end of 2025. An analysis by the nonpartisan Institute on Taxation and Economic The policy found that making the tax cuts permanent would cost $288.5 billion in 2026 alone and would disproportionately benefit the highest-income households. The highest-income 20% of Americans would receive nearly two-thirds of that tax benefit, compared to just 1% for the lowest-income 20% of Americans.
Perhaps the scariest possibility for Democrats is that Republicans would use their government trifecta in Washington to implement a nationwide abortion ban. Trump has said he would veto such a policy, but his repeated whining on the issue has raised questions about that claim. Research has found that existing abortion bans have forced doctors to provide substandard medical care, and they have been blamed for the deaths of at least four women: Josseli Barnica, Nevaeh Crain, Candi Miller and Amber Thurman.
With majorities in both chambers, Republicans could also commit vast resources to support Trump’s plan to deport millions of undocumented immigrants, which became a central part of his reelection platform. Although US courts have affirmed that presidents have wide latitude when it comes to setting immigration policy, Trump will need Congress to appropriate extensive funds to carry out such a massive deportation operation.
In a worrying sign for immigrant rights advocates, Trump said Tuesday after his victory that his deportation program would have “no price tag,” doubling his commitment to the project.
“It’s not a matter of a price tag. It’s not — really, we have no choice,” Trump told NBC News. “When people have killed and murdered, when drug lords have destroyed countries, and now they’re going back to those countries because they won’t stay here.”
In addition to advancing Trump’s platform, Republicans would almost certainly also want to unravel key parts of Biden’s legacy, including the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). The IRA was the nation’s most significant response yet to the climate crisis and has spurred significant energy-related investments in many districts, prompting some Republicans to suggest that Congress should keep some provisions of the law and repeal others.
That dilemma reflects a potential problem for Republicans in full control of Congress: What will they do with the Affordable Care Act (ACA)? When Republicans last held a government trifecta, during Trump’s first two years in office, they tried to repeal and replace the ACA but failed. Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson recently suggested there would be “no Obamacare” if his party gained full control of Congress, according to a video published by NBC News.
But he seemed to undermine this statement, telling his supporters, “The ACA is so deeply entrenched, we need massive reforms to make this work, and we have a lot of ideas about how to do that.”
In recent years, both parties have experienced the pain of governing with narrow majorities, and those problems could resurface in the new Congress. During Biden’s first two years in office, his bills were repeatedly blocked in the Senate even though Democrats had a majority over the concerns of two centrist members of their caucus, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona.
When Republicans had a 52-48 majority in the Senate in 2017, they still failed to repeal and replace the ACA because three members of their conference opposed the proposal. Two of those members — Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska — are still in the Senate and could oppose several parts of Trump’s agenda, especially a possible abortion ban.
And while Republicans won the House of Representatives, their narrow majority could exacerbate the problems that unfolded during the last session of Congress, when internal turmoil at the conference repeatedly brought the chamber to a standstill. Johnson will have to organize a fractious conference that has repeatedly clashed over government financing, foreign aid and the debt ceiling.
Despite the potential challenges of a narrow majority, Trump and his Republican allies have made clear time and again that they will use their newly expanded power to the maximum.
“The mandate that has been granted shows that a majority of Americans desire secure borders, lower costs, peace through strength and a return to common sense,” Johnson wrote in a “Dear Colleague” letter last week. “With a unified Republican government, if we live this historic moment together, we can deliver the most consequential Congress in modern times over the next two years.”
With the country torn between joy and revulsion at the prospect of Trump’s agenda being implemented, much will depend on Republicans’ ability to remain united.
