House conservatives were cautious after Speaker Kevin McCarthy suggested Congress could pass a short-term extension of last year’s spending priorities to give lawmakers more time to put together a deal for in fiscal 2024.
A GOP lawmaker told Fox News Digital McCarthy said in a Monday night full conference call, “We have 11 days, legislative days left before Sept. 30 when the current budget or current … must a [continuing resolution].”
“He wants to make a short-term CR, but not one that jams the holidays,” said the lawmaker.
Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, policy chair of the hard line-right House Freedom Caucus, strongly criticized the proposal after the House GOP’s call.
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“Under no circumstances will I support a ‘continuing resolution’ to fund the government at broken, corrupt levels in 2023…This is especially true if it stupidly ends in December,” Roy said on social media. after the call.
“I can – can – support a short series of 24 hour ‘CR’s’ to create maximum pain for Congress to do the bad job, which – by the way – we can do in Washington right now.”
House Republican leaders were forced to cancel a planned vote on an agriculture spending bill after divisions within the party cast doubt on the vote count. On the left is Speaker Kevin McCarthy. At right is House Freedom Caucus Policy Chair Chip Roy. (Getty Images)
A continuing resolution would extend the current spending priorities, set under the Democratic-controlled 117th Congress, for a certain amount of time. Congress’s failure to pass any kind of spending deal on Sept.
A source familiar with the call Monday night told Fox News Digital McCarthy believes a brief before the end of the year will give Republicans the time they need to put together 12 appropriations bills instead of jamming all their priorities into an “omnibus” bill, something McCarthy promised not to do.
But Freedom Caucus member Rep. Bob Good, R-Va., has signaled he won’t support a short-term continuing resolution on its own that doesn’t include it among House GOP priorities — namely, bills to fix energy or border security. .
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“We have to use that [CR] to try to use something like HR 2, our border security bill, or HR 1, our energy bill … that this administration will accept to reverse some of the harmful policies that have been imposed on the American people by the regime Biden,” Good told Fox News Digital.
Asked if he would support a stopgap bill without such riders, he said, “I’m not sure I would at this point.”
Rep. Bob Good, R-Va., speaks at a news conference on the progress of the fiscal year appropriations legislation outside the U.S. Capitol July 25, 2023, in Washington, DC (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Rep. Ronny Jackson, R-Texas, a conservative ally of former President Trump, similarly suggested he would only support the proposal if it also defunded the Justice Department.
“I WILL NOT VOTE for any continuing resolution that doesn’t smash Biden’s DOJ into a million pieces. The DOJ is rapidly becoming the enemy of the American people, and if nothing is done soon, our right to lose. this,” wrote Jackson on X, formerly Twitter.
A GOP lawmaker who spoke to Fox News Digital on the condition of anonymity to discuss the lawmakers’ call, said McCarthy warned that the alternative would be to allow for a longer continuing resolution but with a full which is a 1% reduction in spending.
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Another source familiar with the call also said McCarthy emphasized that a long-term CR would effectively be an extension of former Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s left-wing policies, something nearly all of House Republicans oppose. The source stressed that most of the members on the call were on the same page about that.
And not all conservatives are opposed to the idea. Rep. Ken Buck, R-Colo., another member of the Freedom Caucus, told Fox News Digital that he believes a short-term CR ending before the holidays would be “appropriate in this situation,” although he doubts that McCarthy would keep his promise on 12 individual spending bills.
US Congressman Ken Buck, R-Colo, before a House Judiciary Committee hearing on “management of the Federal Bureau of Investigation” and alleged politicization of law enforcement on Capitol Hill July 12, 2023. (Shuran Huang for The Washington Post via Getty Images)
“We’re struggling as a conference to come together on spending priorities, and obviously we need a CR to be able to negotiate and conference committees with Democrats,” Buck said. “The Democrats have not passed an appropriations bill. We have already passed one, and there is not enough time to pass all 12 appropriations bills and negotiate with the Senate on other bills.
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“While I think we’re going to pass some, maybe even most, I don’t think we’re going to pass all of the appropriations bills.
McCarthy can only afford to lose five votes to pass a bill along party lines, but a CR is likely to pass with equal Republican and Democratic votes, though the chances are slimmer. little if it includes any of the policy items on the conservatives’ wish list.
