House and Senate Republicans colliding over how to move Trump’s agenda

A month into the new Congress, House and Senate Republicans are still not on the same page on how to tackle President Donald Trump’s agenda raising the possibility the two chambers could be on a collision course that imperils Trump’s domestic priorities in the first months of his second term.

A month into the new Congress, House and Senate Republicans are still not on the same page on how to tackle President Donald Trump’s agenda raising the possibility the two chambers could be on a collision course that imperils Trump’s domestic priorities in the first months of his second term. On Wednesday, Senate Republicans announced they were plowing ahead on their two-step strategy to tackle defense and border provisions first and then move to the more complicated work of tax cuts later in the year. GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, the budget chairman, told Republicans in a private lunch he planned to move the first step of the process – a budget resolution – next week, putting the Senate on track to potentially outpace the House’s own work and possibly putting the House in a position where it may have to choose between swallowing the Senate’s product or doing nothing at all. “I’ve always believed that one big, beautiful bill is too complicated,” Graham said. “What unites Republicans, for sure, is border security and more money for the military. It’s important we put points on the board, and this plan of the president’s to deport people and get rid of the gangs and the criminals is running into a wall of funding.” The Senate’s move comes as House Republicans have been embroiled in an intense intra-party debate about the level of spending cuts to pursue as they look to jam all of Trump’s priorities – defense spending, border security and tax cuts – into one major bill. Members of the House Freedom Caucus such as South Carolina Rep. Ralph Norman have been pushing for roughly $2 trillion in cuts while others have argued the spending cuts should be roughly half that. Members of the Freedom Caucus have also been touting that they think the House GOP should break the bill into two parts, running afoul of both House Speaker Mike Johnson and Trump’s view. House Republicans have been trying to iron out their differences for weeks. The conference focused on their agenda during a three-day retreat in Florida last week, and key House Republicans met for hours on Tuesday night as they sought to find a path forward on their budget blueprint.