Hate End-Of-The-Year Omnibus Spending Bills? Just Wait Until You See the House GOP in Action in the Next Congress

Giant omnibus spending bills are horrible. But the country is about to become ungovernable when the fractious House GOP takes control on January 3

Today, congressional leaders announced a year-end omnibus spending package to fund all government agencies through next fall, approving about $1.7 trillion in spending, with large increases in both defense and domestic spending. 

The cobbling together of 12 appropriations bills into one 4,000+ page mammoth omnibus that must pass to keep the government running has become a congressional pastime. But that doesn’t mean this is a proper way to govern. Of the twelve bills, only six had previously passed the House and none had passed the Senate. This means the content of this omnibus legislation was the handiwork of pretty much just members of the appropriations committees and congressional leadership. The process of glomming the package together, usually as the last thing Congress must do before members can go home to celebrate the holidays with their families, results in spending initiatives and legislation being enacted into law that probably could not otherwise gain sufficient support to be approved. And the need to give something to enough blocs of representatives to get legislation over the finish line means that larger goals, like controlling the budget deficit, fall by the wayside. Outrageous backroom deals tucked into the bill without notice are often revealed once the ink is dry and the chambers have closed for business for the year.

That said, in the following months, we will be looking back at legislation like this, warts and all, with nostalgia.

Ultimately, this bill is the product of legislators who understand that to get a little, you must give a little and that the overarching goal of keeping the government functioning must take priority over individual policy preferences. The bill also reflects the overwhelming sentiment of the American people that we must continue to support Ukraine’s fierce fight for freedom against fascistic Russian imperialism. And the bill wisely contains bipartisan reforms of the arcane Electoral Count Act, ambiguities in which Donald Trump tried to exploit in his desperate attempt to hold on to power following the 2020 election. Like it or not, an omnibus is way to get important things done. 

But the legislative temperament and qualities that produced this legislation are going to be in short supply (or perhaps nonexistent) in the clique that is about to take control of the House of Representatives. Indeed, it is worth noting that neither the House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, nor the lead Republican on the House Appropriations Committee, participated in the negotiations that resulted in this agreement. The fact that Republican senators put McCarthy on the sidelines, preferring to negotiate a deal with Democrats, says a lot about their assessment of what it will be like to legislate when the House GOP takes over in a couple of weeks. 

The unprecedented governmental dysfunction that we are about to experience is being presaged by McCarthy’s struggle to garner the 218 votes he will need to be elected Speaker of the House on January 3. Republicans will hold 222 seats in the new 118th Congress (Democrats will have 212 seats, with one safe Democratic seat vacant due to the death of Rep. Donald McEachin).  According to the Congressional Research Service, “[t]he long-standing practice of the House is that electing a Speaker requires a numerical majority of the votes cast by Members ‘for a person by name.’” If all 434 newly sworn members are present and cast a vote for Speaker, this means McCarthy needs 218 of the 222 members of the Republican caucus to be elected. (If members vote “present” or fail to vote, the number of votes needed to elect the Speaker declines. For example, in the 117th Congress, 433 members were sworn, but six either voted “present” or did not vote, lowering the threshold to 213. Nancy Pelosi was elected Speaker with 216 votes (out of 222 Democratic members)).

Keep in mind, electing a Speaker should be the easiest task a party faces. No party has required more than one floor vote to elect a Speaker since 1923. Indeed, if a party cannot internally agree to find a way to muster a majority behind a person to be its leader, this signifies a level of party divisiveness that will make it difficult to create majorities on the far harder task of passing legislation down the road.

But from all reports it appears that McCarthy currently does not have 218 votes to become Speaker and no clear path for doing so. Five Republican members have vowed not to vote for McCarthy under any circumstance. When one of them was asked if there were any circumstances in which he could envision voting for McCarthy, he responded, “I could be dead.” Opposition to McCarthy could be even more substantial, as 31 members of the far-right Freedom Caucus voted against him during the internal party vote last month.

Foreshadowing the chaos in the House to come, it appears that many of the recalcitrant Republican conference members are demanding that McCarthy amend the House rules to allow any member bring a motion to the House floor at any time to remove the Speaker. Given the narrow margins in the 118th Congress, and the assumption that all Democrats would support such a motion, this would give any 5 Republican members tremendous leverage over the new Speaker to advocate for their policy preferences. Satisfying the 5 most extreme Republican members would almost certainly alienate 5 other members of the caucus, many of whom just won seats from marginal districts in New York and California. Thus, even if McCarthy can get himself elected Speaker, there are no indications that he will be able to keep his caucus sufficiently unified to be able to pass legislation. And then even if he can get legislation passed through the House, McCarthy will have virtually no leeway to cut deals with the Democratic Senate and White House.

These are early warning signs that we are headed for unprecedented times. While gridlock in Congress during periods of divided government are not infrequent in recent history, there are no indications that the incoming House GOP majority will be able to do two things that the government absolutely must do:  pass legislation to fund the government and pass an increase in the debt limit so money can be borrowed to operate the government and pay for programs like Social Security and Medicare. (I would personally add that continuing aid to Ukraine is equally vital, but the omnibus provided even more support than Biden requested, so this issue will not arise for a while).

The omnibus bill slated to pass this week will fund the government until the end of the fiscal year on September 30, 2023. It is estimated that the debt limit will need to be extended again in July 2023, but with extraordinary measures by the Treasury Department, that deadline could be pushed back a month or two until September as well. 

Enjoy the relative stability we will hopefully experience the next nine months. Fall 2023 may be very rough indeed.