The House Freedom Caucus has taken an official position in favor of adopting a continuing resolution to extend government funding beyond the September 30 deadline and into early 2025, with the intention of avoiding a year-end omnibus that could be favorable to the Democrats.
The hard-line conservative group’s move amounts to a shot in the arm in the funding battle that will dominate Congress when it returns from its August recess — and that will provide a critical test for House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.).
In the official position released Monday, the Freedom Caucus also calls for pairing a stopgap measure with the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, a bill led by Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), member of the Freedom Caucus, to expand the proof of citizenship requirements for voting in federal elections and impose voter roll expungement requirements on states. The Chamber approved the project in June.
“The House Freedom Caucus believes House Republicans should return to Washington to continue the work of passing all 12 appropriations bills to cut spending and advance our policy priorities. If unsuccessful, in the inevitability of Congress considering a continuing resolution, government funding must be extended until early 2025 to avoid a limp bus that preserves Democratic spending and policies until the next administration,” the group said in official position.
“Additionally, the Continuing Resolution must include the SAVE Act – as requested by President Trump – to prevent non-citizens from voting to preserve free and fair elections in light of the millions of illegal aliens imported by the Biden-Harris administration over the past four years ”, he added.
The Freedom Caucus’ official positions require the support of 80 percent of the group, which consists of about three dozen members. In the House’s slim majority, that’s enough to sink any measure uniformly opposed by Democrats, but it can’t stop a measure that has significant bipartisan support.
Even before heading into their August recess, lawmakers predicted that House funding battles over spending — with infighting resulting in GOP leadership withdrawing from scheduled votes on several appropriations bills — would move away from the projects. individual bills and would turn to the framework of a continuing resolution to avoid a government shutdown on October 1. For hard-line conservatives, a year-end omnibus negotiated by party leaders, which has often resulted in increased spending and funding for policies they oppose, is the worst-case scenario.
Asked in an interview with The Hill last week about the effort to extend government funding through 2025, Johnson said he was “thinking about all these alternatives.”
“We are having a very careful discussion about the pros and cons of the various strategies, and that decision is not yet determined, but it will be very soon,” Johnson said, adding that it would be “up to the country” to have a shutdown.
A statement outlining the Freedom Caucus’ position said the group intended to ensure that Democrats “cannot undermine President Trump’s second term with a ‘lame duck’ omnibus in December.”
Other House Republicans worry that extending government funding beyond the end of the year could backfire because Trump’s victory in 2024 — let alone Republicans maintaining control of the House and winning the Senate — is not certain, and that the funding extension could give Democrats the opportunity to enact an even more liberal funding plan than the one President Biden could sign into a December omnibus.
Furthermore, Republicans who oppose the Freedom Caucus’ position fear that even if Trump wins, a funding battle in Congress as he reestablishes himself in the White House would only divert attention from other pressing priorities.
Johnson suggested to The Hill that it was “not obvious” that a continuing resolution would even be necessary, noting that the House has passed several spending bills to fund most of the government.
But with just 13 days of voting scheduled in the House before the end of the fiscal year, avoiding a continuing resolution is highly unlikely. The Senate did not pass any funding bills. Those the House has approved — representing about half of the 12 “regular” appropriations bills — are partisan and would need more negotiation to pass the Democratic-controlled Senate.
Congress did not follow its own dictated process of approving all 12 appropriations bills forfinance the governmentbefore the start of the fiscal year on October 1 since 1997.
Whatever stance Johnson takes to avoid a shutdown could have consequences for him. Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) was removed from office just days after passing a “clean” continuing resolution to avoid a shutdown, with several of the eight members who voted to remove him citing his stance on issues of financing. McCarthy claims that those who removed him, like Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Florida), who is under investigation by the House Ethics Committee, had more personal vendettas.
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
