Playbook PM: Megabill malaise sinks key committee vote

Politico

16-05-2025

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THE CATCH-UP
Another day, another very public setback for House Republicans leaders.
The House Budget Committee failed to advance the party's sweeping megabill, with a band of conservative hard-liners joining all Democrats to tank the package — for now. 'House GOP leaders plan to continue private talks with the reluctant Republicans and the White House over the weekend in hopes of resurrecting the package next week,' POLITICO's Jennifer Scholtes and Meredith Lee Hill report.
It's a significant, though not entirely unexpected, blow for Speaker Mike Johnson, who set next week as the target for getting the megabill through his chamber after weeks of intense debate over the extent of the bill's tax provisions, Medicaid cuts and plenty of other pieces.
How it went down: GOP leaders held hours of late-night negotiations to prepare for today's committee vote and were optimistic this morning. Just before the proceedings kicked off, President Donald Trump weighed in, urging the Republican holdouts to get in line.
'We don't need 'GRANDSTANDERS' in the Republican Party. STOP TALKING, AND GET IT DONE! It is time to fix the MESS that Biden and the Democrats gave us,' Trump wrote on Truth Social.
That didn't work: As the committee settled in, Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), who was noticeably distressed said that the bill fell 'profoundly short' of his expectations. 'The fact of the matter is this bill has back-loaded savings and has front-loaded spending,' Roy said. 'And I'm not going to sit here and say that everything is hunky-dory when this is the Budget Committee. This is the Budget Committee!'
After an initial delay, the committee plowed ahead with the vote. Roy and Reps. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.), Josh Brecheen (R-Okla.) and Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.) voted no — with Rep. Lloyd Smucker (R-Pa.) changing his 'yes' to a 'no' at the end — to sink the measure, 16-21. (Smucker later clarified that his changed vote was only a procedural move.)
So what now? House GOP lawmakers need to regroup once again. Budget Chair Jodey Arrington (R-Texas) said there would be no further action from the panel until next week with the 'goal' of meeting again on Monday. 'Godspeed and safe travels,' he said, dismissing the members for the weekend.
As Roy said, there's a lot of work to do. Republican leaders — and likely the White House — will need to lean on the hard-liners, who appear dug in barring some significant changes.
What's on the table: Some of the measures being considered to placate the holdouts include 'enforcing work requirements on Medicaid recipients earlier than the 2029 deadline in the bill and immediately revoking Medicaid benefits from undocumented immigrants,' Jennifer and Meredith report. Leaders also floated 'a new, heightened state-and-local-tax deduction,' Meredith and Rachael Bade report. That would see a $40,000 cap for individuals and an $80,000 cap for joint filers.
The House Freedom Caucus, in a statement posted on X after the vote, said they were 'making progress before the vote in the Budget Committee and will continue negotiations to further improve the reconciliation package. We are not going anywhere and we will continue to work through the weekend.'
Another headache: A new analysis from the nonpartisan Penn Wharton Budget Model, which the Hill keeps a close eye on, finds that the GOP tax plan 'may offer only modest gains to everyday workers, according to a wide range of tax experts, and some taxpayers may actually be left in worse financial shape if the bill becomes law,' NYT's Tony Romm reports.
For now, Johnson's Memorial Day deadline is looking more like a strong suggestion.
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6 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW
1. RUSSIA-UKRAINE LATEST: Russia and Ukraine wrapped up the countries' first direct peace talks in three years today in Turkey. While no major headway was made toward a ceasefire deal, the two sides did agree to their biggest POW swap since the start of the war, per the NYT. 'After the negotiations, which lasted an hour and 40 minutes, the leaders of the Ukrainian and Russian delegations confirmed in news briefings that they had agreed to exchange 1,000 prisoners each in the near future.'
Delegations came into the talks with low expectations for a final deal, and indeed 'the chasm between the two sides was quickly apparent' at the Turkish palace where negotiators met, Reuters reports. During the discussions, Kyiv accused the Kremlin of introducing new 'unacceptable demands' to withdraw Ukrainian forces from the region, AP's Hanna Arhirova and Andrew Wilks report. A senior Ukrainian official said Kyiv 'reiterated it remained focused on achieving real progress — an immediate ceasefire and a pathway to substantive diplomacy.' The question now is whether the talks this week were enough to get Trump directly involved.
2. MIDDLE EAST LATEST: Trump returns to Washington today from his Middle East trip without a secured nuclear deal with Iran, though the president did acknowledge on Air Force One this morning that a proposal was delivered to Iranian leaders, per the AP. He did not share any specifics of the deal. 'Most importantly, they know they have to move quickly, or something bad is going to happen,' Trump told reporters.
Upon boarding his flight home, the president also offered a sympathetic tone toward Gaza. 'We're looking at Gaza, and we got to get that taken care of. A lot of people are starving. A lot of people. There's a lot of bad things going on,' Trump said, per NYT's Luke Broadwater and Erika Solomon. 'I think a lot of good things are going to happen over the next month,' he said, adding that 'we have to help' Palestinians.
3. IN A BOX TO THE LEFT: Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) continues to be a divisive figure in the Democratic Party, but Republicans 'are openly courting Fetterman to join their 53-seat majority,' WaPo's Liz Goodwin and Theodoric Meyer report. Fetterman has repeatedly denied that he would ever formally cross the aisle. Still, some Democrats 'have been mystified at what they see as [Fetterman's] standoffish behavior, saying he blows off meeting requests, spurns senators' weekly lunches and has left the caucus's private group chat.' Some also say the Pennsylvania lawmaker 'has grown more isolated over the past year and appears disengaged' from his role. The concerns come after former staffers shared concerns about his mental and physical health in stories from the AP and N.Y. Mag earlier this month.
4. GRANITE STATE UPDATE: Hanna Trudo — the former journalist who's now exploring a congressional bid in New Hampshire — is facing a headline calling attention to her 'millionaire lifestyle' despite her claims that she was brought up in a ''working class' home, raised by a single mother,' The Daily Mail's Charlie Spiering reports. After Trudo reportedly 'ghosted' the 'Ruthless' podcast after asking to be on the show, producers on the show 'began investigating her background and started leaking a trail of public information, revealing her luxurious public life behind the scenes,' including an 'exclusive dating website' and 'an image of her social media of an expensive Ferrari.'
Trudo's response: 'Sorry gentlemen, I like fashion AND Medicare for All! $15 minimum wage,' she wrote in a post on X, linking to the Daily Mail story. 'You can try and shame me into not running for #NH1 because you hate progressives, but not for being a fabulous woman. Live Free or Die.'
5. KNOWING RUSSELL VOUGHT: The Atlantic's McKay Coppins profiles the OMB director, diving into how the Project 2025 architect is working behind the scenes to impose a 'radical new constitutional order' in Trump's second term. Vought rarely gives interviews — and indeed declined one for the piece — but 'when he does speak in public, he is usually explicating the wonkish intricacies of the federal government in a nasal voice. His job title is dull and opaque. Even his physical bearing is forgettable: Bald and bespectacled, with a graying beard, he looks a bit like a middle-school social-studies teacher. … But whereas [Elon] Musk's influence already seems to be waning, Vought remains among the most powerful figures in today's Washington.'
The fight is the point: 'Vought's critics have warned that elements of his agenda … are eroding checks and balances and pushing the country toward a constitutional crisis. But in interviews over the past several weeks, some of his allies told me that's the whole point. The kind of revolutionary upending of the constitutional order that Vought envisions won't happen without deliberate fights with Congress and the judiciary, they told me. If a crisis is coming, it's because Vought is courting one.'
6. THREE'S COMPANY: 'Three Friends in the Senate All Rise to Power at the Same Time,' by NOTUS' Ursula Perano: 'It's an already-made-for-TV story: three politicians, all close friends, all rising to power at the same time. For Sens. Chris Murphy, Brian Schatz and Cory Booker, it's reality. … For now, the trio's different lanes are clear in the short term. The long term is hazier, particularly with an open 2028 Democratic presidential primary on the horizon and turnover in Senate Democratic Caucus leadership bound to happen at some point. … Each of the three — in their own unique ways — seems positioned to make a move.'
TALK OF THE TOWN
THE WEEKEND AHEAD
TV TONIGHT — PBS' 'Washington Week': Peter Baker, Stephen Hayes, David Ignatius and Andrea Mitchell.
SUNDAY SO FAR …
CNN 'State of the Union': Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
ABC 'This Week': Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) … Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.). Panel: Donna Brazile, Reince Priebus, Sarah Isgur and Faiz Shakir.
Fox News 'Sunday Morning Futures': Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.). Panel: FBI Director Kash Patel and Dan Bongino.
NBC 'Meet the Press': Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent … Mike Pence … Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.). Panel: Ashley Etienne, Stephen Hayes, Andrea Mitchell and Amna Nawaz.
NewsNation 'The Hill Sunday': Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-Mont.) … Rep. Marc Veasey (D-Texas). Panel: George Will, Sarah McCammon, Julie Mason and Julia Manchester.
MSNBC 'The Weekend': Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont.
CBS 'Face the Nation': Robert Gates … retired Gen. Stanley McChrystal.
MUSIC TO HIS EARS — Trump played some of his greatest hits on the way back from his Middle East trip this morning. 'Has anyone noticed that, since I said 'I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT,' she's no longer 'HOT?'' he wrote in a Truth Social post. He then moved on to 'Highly Overrated' Bruce Springsteen: 'This dried out 'prune' of a rocker (his skin is all atrophied!) ought to KEEP HIS MOUTH SHUT until he gets back into the Country, that's just 'standard fare.' Then we'll all see how it goes for him!' (Springsteen called Trump 'treasonous' at a concert this week. It's unclear exactly what prompted Trump's shot at Swift.)
OUT AND ABOUT — The Wine & Spirits Wholesalers of America hosted its annual 'Toast to Congress' reception on Wednesday, drawing a spirited crowd of wine and spirits wholesalers, lawmakers and Hill staffers for an evening of cocktails and conversation. Guests sipped on 'Feeling Fancy Margaritas' and celebrated at the event's five sponsored bars. SPOTTED: Reps. Beth Van Duyne (R-Texas), Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), Mark Alford (R-Mo.) and Laura Friedman (D-Calif.), Dina Opici, Danny Wirtz, Michael Martignetti, Lara Diaz Dunbar, Steve Gibbs, Carl Hulse, Catie Edmondson, Cameron Henderson, Angela Greiling Keane, Kate Ackley, Natalie Fertig, Frank Coleman, Dawson Hobbs, Michael Bilello, Catherine McDaniel, Dwayne Carson, Cody Tucker, Alena McGonigle and Daniel Jarrell.
— SPOTTED at a spring reception for Radiant Nuclear at TAKODA Navy Yard with Radiant COO Tori Shivanandan: Rep. Pat Harrigan (R-N.C.), Katherine Sears, Alice Caponiti, Chris Loranger, John McCarthy, Sean McCabe, Maddie Mitchell, Austin Davis, Joshua Henderson, Stephen Sisel, Jack Britt, Jack Edlow and Stephen Burns.
TRANSITIONS — Colleen Roh Sinzdak is joining Milbank as a partner in the Supreme Court and appellate practice. She previously was assistant to the solicitor general. … Sarah Tellock is joining Acadia Pharmaceuticals to lead its federal government affairs efforts. She previously was director of congressional affairs and alliance development for the Alzheimer's Association and Alzheimer's Impact Movement. ….
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