Speaker Mike Johnson’s efforts to pass a short-term spending bill before Friday’s deadline should have been fairly easy. Instead, it has become yet another test of his ability to manage a chaotic conference as he embraces an ambitious agenda next year.
Johnson and his team are working to minimize defections from the Republican Party while maintaining sufficient Democratic support as he cannot pass the funding extension with Republican votes alone. But demands for farm aid from Republicans in agricultural-heavy districts are complicating negotiations, prompting Democrats to ask for additional concessions and fueling conservative anger over the increased spending.
Those hardliners wouldn’t vote for a relief bill anyway, but if they are angry enough it could spell trouble for Johnson on Jan. 3, when he will need near-unanimous support from the Republican Party to continue as speaker.
Johnson already tried to appease the ultra-conservatives, but this move inflamed the Republicans in the farm district; He rejected their request last Tuesday to fund economic relief through conservation money in Democrats’ partisan Inflation Reduction Act. Johnson and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell stuck to that position during Friday night’s talks. That prompted Republican lawmakers to publicly and privately threaten to vote against the final funding freeze if it did not include billions in economic aid for farmers.
“It’s a must-have,” said House Agriculture Chairman GT Thompson. He and others argue they need additional economic aid to protect struggling farmers from a new wave of bankruptcies and financial pain in rural America, where a majority of voters backed Donald Trump.
Thompson said he was “pleased with the conversations” taking place now, after leadership talks on the issue flared overnight on December 13. Johnson’s team spent the weekend quietly trying to stem a huge wave of Republican opposition in the farm district to the funding measure. . Appropriations Chairman Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said Monday that the “differences are narrowing.”
“We’re working through it. I am optimistic,” he added.
Still, it’s a bad sign for Republicans in the next Congress. Unlike a funding point, negotiations over ambitious party-line bills on the border, taxes and energy are already expected to be extremely complicated. Despite Trump coming to the White House and Republicans taking control of the Senate, Johnson will still have an uphill task as he navigates the demands of a diverse conference on several high-priority campaign issues with virtually no room for error.
“Next year will be fun,” a GOP aide involved in the funding talks said wryly, granted anonymity to speak candidly.
For now, Republican leaders have told lawmakers that Johnson wants to approve the full government funding measure and a separate supplemental disaster package, through a process called a suspension. But that process requires a two-thirds majority, meaning Johnson will need all the support he can get, not just from his own party, but also from Democrats. And Johnson’s opponents will be closely watching whether he can convince a majority of Republicans to vote for the ultimate spending deal, which is seen as a key test of leadership support within Republican ranks.
Hardliners are already largely opposed to the farm bill expansion that leaders want to attach to the stopgap, arguing that Congress should cut farm subsidies and other spending. That group is now leaning on Johnson to reject new spending in the funding emergency because his speakership is at stake.
“When I add things to the farm bill, I know farmers are hurting, but where does this come from?” said Freedom Caucus member Ralph Norman (RS.C.).
Republican leaders did not count on some of these conservatives voting in favor of the financing deal, because they generally take a principled stance against stopgap solutions. If Johnson loses more Republican votes, he will have to bow to more Democratic demands to get the package through Congress before Friday’s deadline.
Congressional leaders circled Monday on a final financing deal with $10 billion in economic aid for farmers as part of the agreement, possibly up to $12 billion depending on what Republicans agree to on Democratic demands in return. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) told reporters Monday morning that leaders may release the text of the massive bill in the coming hours, but he emphasized that nothing has been finalized yet.
“No white smoke yet, still working on the last bits,” Scalise said late Monday morning.
There is another demand that Johnson is trying to balance. Farm district representatives Zach Nunn (R-Iowa) and Don Bacon (R-Neb.) are behind an effort to include a waiver in the spending package that would allow year-round sales of E15 ethanol fuel to make. Conservatives, who overwhelmingly oppose ethanol subsidies, are outraged by that prospect.
Trump himself has a complicated history balancing support for the ethanol and oil industries.
Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), an outspoken conservative who generally opposes emergency funding bills and has not said how he will vote on the speakership, said Monday that the ethanol deal and other provisions should not be included in the spending package.
“Call me crazy, but we need to reduce the budget deficit and not implement stupid policies,” Roy, a member of the Freedom Caucus, said on X.
