House GOP Releases Short-Term Budget Bill

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Facts

  • Over the weekend, the House GOP revealed details of a short-term government funding bill to avoid a government shutdown while cutting funding by 8% to domestic agencies, except for Veteran Affairs and the Pentagon.1
  • The legislation, which would fund the government through Oct. 31, also includes restrictions on immigration and the US border with Mexico. However, the measure lacks the funding the Biden administration requested for Ukraine.2
  • Representatives from two of the Republicans’ five ideological factions — the Freedom Caucus and the Main Street Caucus — negotiated the deal. A total of GOP members conducted the negotiations.3
  • The bill will be considered on the House floor this week along with the fiscal 2024 defense spending bill, which was stopped last week by some conservative detractors.4
  • The stopgap bill isn’t guaranteed to pass the House, where Republicans have an extremely thin majority. It’s also highly unlikely to pass the Senate, where Democrats hold the majority.4
  • The debate over how to prevent a government shutdown comes as Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy — who last week announced an official impeachment inquiry into Pres. Biden — still faces threats of being removed from his post.5

Sources: 1Abc news, 2Reuters, 3Washington Post, 4Roll call and 5USA Today.

Narratives

  • Republican narrative, as provided by FOX News. It should be the goal of every Republican and every conservative to reduce government spending, increase border security, and eliminate woke from government policies. This bill does it all. If the Senate, led by Democrats, doesn’t agree with the provisions in this bill, it will prove they’re out of touch and infatuated with woke, government spending to understand what’s best for the country.
  • Democratic narrative, as provided by New York Times. First, a major faction of the GOP held vital Pentagon funding hostage in an attempt to get more spending cuts to unrelated programs. Now they’re using a government shutdown as a threat, and their only stopgap solution reinstates Trump-era border restrictions, makes steep cuts, and ignores the president’s request for Ukraine aid. This is a bad-faith tactic by extreme conservatives to avoid blame for a shutdown if it occurs.

Predictions