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Dear John,
A valuable lesson was provided to congressional Republicans just a few days ago, on the eve of the potential “government shutdown”. Let’s hope they learned it!
To recap, the December continuing resolution, or “CR”, was set to expire on March 14 at midnight, which meant that all “non-essential” government operations would temporarily pause. The threat of a shutdown has been used by House and Senate Republicans as an excuse to continue funding Biden’s Budget for more than 2 years since Republicans gained control of the House. Time-and-again, to pre-emptively avoid the possibility of a shutdown, Republican leadership joined with Democrats to extend Biden’s Budget---including his policies and deficit-exploding spending levels.
But this time, after House Republicans passed the latest CR with only 1 Democrat vote, it was Chuck Schumer who threatened to shut down the government. His stated plan was to deny the 60 votes needed to break a Senate filibuster, rather than pass the CR that is essentially an extension, yet again, of Biden’s Budget. But then Schumer blinked, because he was the one afraid of being blamed for a government shutdown. Senate Democrats helped Republicans pass the CR and kept the government open. (Notably, both Virginia Senators---Kaine and Warner---voted to shut down the government.)
The only spending cut in the CR was the elimination of $13 billion in earmarks, which is the mother’s milk of corrupt politics. Earmarks are special pork projects in participating legislators’ districts, and are used to buy votes for bad bills. The current representative of Virginia’s 5th District must be disappointed, as he and his team have spent the past couple of months soliciting ideas for his share of earmarks. Thankfully, these were excluded from the CR.
So, what needs to happen next in the spending battles? Again, it is always only about the money in Washington! I believe that there should be 4 very important objectives for Republicans:
1 – The Trump Administration must continue their DOGE and “impoundment” actions, and simply refuse to spend all of the money appropriated in the just-passed CR. This is a promise that was made to Freedom Caucus members in order to get their support for the CR. This means continuing to “claw back” money from agencies and NGO’s, slashing foreign aid, downsizing the federal workforce, eliminating departments, and not funding egregious and harmful leftist policies.
2 – Congress must codify into law the executive actions and policies being temporarily implemented by the Trump administration, including real spending cuts and elimination of agencies and departments. This is the only way to protect these changes from being overturned by a future Democrat president.
3 – Republicans must hold the line and not weaken the recent House-passed budget “reconciliation” proposal. The House version contains $2 trillion in Freedom Caucus-led spending cuts, while the Senate version contains no spending cuts. These must be “reconciled”, which means they don’t need 60 votes in the Senate. President Trump and Speaker Johnson must pressure all Republicans in Congress to reject the Senate version, and pass the House version!
4 – Finally, congressional Republicans must pass the required 12 appropriations bills by September 30, making massive spending cuts, shrinking government, and reversing the harmful Democrat policies---or be willing to shut it down! We cannot keep promising “next time”. Next time is NOW. Make Schumer cave again!
In short, congressional Republicans must have the courage and conviction to put their legislative careers on the line, by taking the tough votes to implement real and long-lasting change. We must meet the moment and not let this opportunity pass us by. Our country’s future depends on it!
I want to invite you to an event I am hosting in Campbell County next Saturday, March 29, at 5 p.m. at the home of Paul & Beckie Nix. The address is 53 Sleigh Ride Circle in Concord. I will be sharing my thoughts on the situation in Washington and what Republicans should be doing for the country. Tickets can be purchased at the link below, and proceeds will help pay off campaign debt and support my efforts to stay in the fight for our country.
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