The 1,547-page stopgap spending bill to avoid a government shutdown is effectively dead. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) all but scrapped the plan after President-elect Trump, Vice President-elect Vance and Elon Musk torched the package to avert a government shutdown this weekend and finance it until March 14. .
If House Republicans had had the votes to pass the bill, without relying too much on Democrats, it is possible that Republicans could have passed the bill on Wednesday afternoon before the Lords intervened. Trump and Vance. But there was simply too much popular pressure, brought on by Musk at X and elsewhere.
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The stopgap spending package proved unpopular due to its size, and various legislative decorations adorned the bill like a Christmas tree. Conservatives had expected Johnson to handle the spending plan differently this year over the holidays. But it backfired. Seriously.
It is notable that Trump did not intervene until the last moment. He also demanded an increase in the debt ceiling. This is something the president-elect faced in the first quarter of the year and threatened to derail any legislative agenda or potentially spook the markets.
Johnson’s decision to veer off course – despite effusively promoting the bill on Fox this morning – underlines several things.
President-elect Donald Trump reacts during his meeting with Prince William, Prince of Wales, at the United Kingdom Embassy Residence on December 7, 2024 in Paris, France. (Oleg Nikishin/Getty Images)
This is a sign of things to come once President-elect Trump is in office. And could that present problems for Johnson, as he may become subject to the new president’s decisions?
Why did Johnson withdraw the bill?
He was tremendously unpopular among his base. But the situation descended further once Musk and the president-elect infused themselves.
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In many respects, Johnson’s decision to withdraw the bill was due to January 3. That is the day of the Speaker’s vote. With 434 members to start the new Congress, Johnson needs 218 votes. Otherwise, he lacks a majority and cannot become president. The House must vote repeatedly, as it did in January 2023, before electing former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) five days later, in what was the longest presidential race since the 1850s.
Johnson tried to save himself from the president’s vote by adding emergency farm spending to the bill. But Johnson is now trying to save himself by introducing a new bill.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) listens during a press conference following the Republican conference meeting at the US Capitol on January 17, 2024, in Washington, DC. (Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)
The irony is that Johnson did not want to create drama before Christmas with a spending package. But drama is exactly what he got in what quickly became the worst holiday congressional showdown since the 2012 fiscal cliff or the threatened government shutdown in 2014.
So here’s the $64,000 question: What play does Johnson call next?
Do you make a clean CR to fund the government with nothing attached? Is this a bill that simply increases current funding along with disaster relief? Do they include a suspension of the debt ceiling as President-elect Trump has requested?
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And then the most important question of all: can something happen? Especially without Democratic votes?
Johnson has a group of Tories who won’t vote for any CR at all. Many of them would also not vote in favor of raising the debt ceiling.
And even if there was a new bill, do the Conservatives insist on waiting three days to consider it? That triggers a government shutdown right there.
The United States Capitol in Washington, DC, on Monday, November 11, 2024. (Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
The deadline is Friday at 11:59:59 pm ET.
So this will require someone to pull a rabbit out of a hat.
President-elect Trump’s move today is reminiscent of a similar action he took in December 2019, which caused the longest government shutdown in history.
Then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), then-Appropriations Committee Chairman Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) and others thought they had a deal to fund the government and avoid a shutdown in Christmas.
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The Senate voted in favor of the bill. Senators even sat at the back of the chamber and sang Christmas carols during the vote.
Then Trump balked at the last minute. House Republicans did the same. The government shut down for more than a month.
