Senate GOP plots how to move Trump's $9.4B clawbacks request

Politico

3 days ago

Senate Republicans are also banking on House Republicans swallowing any changes they make to the rescissions package — similar to their strategy on Trump's megabill — after the lawmakers across the Capitol narrowly passed the president's clawbacks request last month without changes.
'We'll see where it goes,' Thune told reporters Tuesday, adding that while he hasn't done a hard vote count yet he is assuming Republicans will at least be able to get it onto the Senate floor.
Asked if he was worried about Collins or other moderates voting against the bill, Thune demurred, suggesting those conversations were still to come.
'We'll have a lot of conversations about it, and we'll get a better sense of where our members are,' Thune said.
Some Republican senators who generally back the package also support attempts to amend it.
'Right now, I'm lean yes,' Sen. Thom Tillis said Tuesday night about passage of the package.
But the retiring North Carolina senator said some of his Republican colleagues have also made persuasive arguments in favor of protecting money for PEPFAR, the global AIDS reduction campaign Trump is seeking to slash by $400 million.
'I'm open to it, if it makes the rescission better,' Tillis said of amending the package.
If Congress rejects the package or doesn't clear it through both chambers by the July 18 deadline, Trump would be forced to spend the money and prevented from requesting the same cuts again.
But if the package passes, the White House will finally be able to send back to the Treasury a small slice of the billions of dollars in proposed funding cuts made in recent months. That includes reductions Elon Musk dictated as head of the Department of Government Efficiency before leaving his Trump administration role.
White House allies are also predicting a political blowup from Trump if the Senate falls short. Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said that if the bill fails, the White House 'will go nuts' and that it would be an 'embarrassment to the president.'
'I think if the Republicans in the United States Senate do not pass the rescission package, after all the rhetoric about reducing spending, then they should hide their head in the bag, and I think the White House will provide the bag,' Kennedy added.
In 2018, Senate Republicans, who had a slightly narrower majority, rejected an effort during the first Trump administration to revoke congressionally approved spending. Trump officials say they tailored their latest request to make it as politically palatable as possible, but they've also flirted with leapfrogging Congress and trying to rescind funding on their own if the Senate falls short.
Cassandra Dumay, Mia McCarthy and Calen Razor contributed to this report.