WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump abruptly rejected a bipartisan plan Wednesday to prevent a Christmastime government shutdown, instead telling House Speaker Mike Johnson and Republicans to essentially renegotiate — days before a deadline when federal funding runs out.
Trump’s sudden entrance into the debate and new demands sent Congress spiraling as lawmakers are trying to wrap up work and head home for the holidays. It leaves Johnson scrambling to engineer a new plan before Friday’s deadline to keep government open.
“Republicans must GET SMART and TOUGH,” Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance said in a statement.
The president-elect made an almost unrealistic proposal that combined some continuation of government funds along with a much more controversial provision to raise the nation’s debt limit — something his own party routinely rejects. “Anything else is a betrayal of our country,” they wrote.
Democrats decried the GOP revolt over the stopgap measure, which would have also provided some $100.4 billion in disaster aid to states hammered by Hurricanes Helene and Milton and other natural disasters.
“House Republicans have been ordered to shut down the government and hurt everyday Americans all across this country,” said House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries.
Jeffries said “an agreement is an agreement,” and by backing out of it “the House Republicans “will now own any harm that is visited upon the American people.”
Already, the massive 1,500-page bill was on the verge of collapse, as hard right conservatives rejected the increased spending, egged on by Trump’s billionaire ally Elon Musk who rejected the plan almost as soon as it was released late Tuesday night.
Rank-and-file lawmakers complained about the extras, which included their first pay-raises in more than a decade — a shock after one of the most unproductive chaotic sessions in modern times.
Even the addition of much-needed disaster aid, some $100.4 billion in the aftermath of hurricanes and other natural calamities that ravaged states this year, plus $10 billion in economic assistance for farmers failed to win over the budget-slashing GOP.
A number of Republicans were waiting for Trump to signal whether they should vote yes or no.
“This should not pass,” Musk posted on his social media site X in the wee hours of Wednesday morning.
One lawmaker said office phone lines were flooded with calls from constituents
“My phone was ringing off the hook,” said Rep. Andy Barr, R-Ky. “The people who elected us are listening to Elon Musk.”
The outcome comes as no surprise for Johnson, who like other Republican House speakers before him, has been unable to convince his majority to go along with the routine needs of federal government operations, which they would prefer to slash.
It all shows just how hard it will be for Republicans next year, as they seize control of the House, Senate and White House, to unify and lead the nation. And it underscores how much Johnson and the GOP leaders must depend on Trump’s blessing to see any legislative package over the finish line.
Musk, who is heading Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency, warned that “Any member of the House or Senate who votes for this outrageous spending bill deserves to be voted out in 2 years!”
It’s not an idle threat coming from Musk, the world’s richest man, who helped bankroll Trump’s victory and can easily use his America PAC to make or break political careers.
Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland said this is the problem with “an oligarchy a handful of wealthy people run everything and everyone is supposed to live in fear of them.”
Democrats, who negotiated the final product with Johnson and Senate GOP leadership, will be expected to provide enough support to help ensure passage, as is often the case on big, bipartisan bills.
However, Trump’s new demands on the debt limit pose a daunting test for Johnson, who has worked hard to stay close to the president-elect, only to have him turn against his hard-fought plan.
Trump posted later that he was insisting on the debt ceiling: “I will fight ’till the end.”
The nation’s debt limit expires 2025 and Trump appears to want the issue off the table before he returns to the White House, a reasonable idea but one that typically takes months to negotiate.
The last House speaker, Kevin McCarthy, worked for months with President Joe Biden to raise the debt limit. Even though they struck a bipartisan deal that cut spending in exchange for additional borrowing capacity, House Republicans said it didn’t go far enough, and it ended up costing McCarthy his job.
Now, Trump is looking for Johnson to pass a debt ceiling extension some 48 hours before a partial government shutdown.
Meanwhile, the bipartisan package that Trump rejected extended existing government programs and services at their current operating levels for a few more months, through March 14, 2025.
The stopgap measure is needed because Congress has failed to pass its annual appropriations bills to fund all the various agencies in the federal government, from the Pentagon and national security apparats, to the health, welfare, transportation and other routine domestic services.
But the inches-thick bill goes beyond routine funding and tacks on several other measures.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., called it essentially a junk sandwich, using a swear word.
And then there’s the pay raise.
The bill would have turned off a pay-freeze provision and that could allow a maximum adjustment of 3.8% or $6,600 in 2025, bringing lawmakers’ annual pay to $180,600, according to a Congressional Research Service report. Members of Congress last got a raise in 2009.
Among other provisions, there’s full federal funding to rebuild Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge, which collapsed when struck by a cargo ship that reported losing power just before the crash. Federal taxpayers will be reimbursed through proceeds from insurance payments and litigation.
And there’s a provision to transfer the land that is the site of the old RFK Stadium from the federal government to the District of Columbia, which could potentially lead to a new stadium for the Washington Commanders.
On the health care front, the legislation seeks to extend coverage of telehealth appointments for Medicare enrollees and rein in how much money pharmacy benefits managers — the companies that negotiate how and what drugs are covered by insurance plans — make off those deals.
The bill also includes provisions focused on countering China, including expanding on Biden’s executive order that seeks to restrict investments into countries that pose a national security threat to the United States. Blocking China’s high-tech ambitions is one of the few issues that enjoys broad support in Washington from both Republicans and Democrats.
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Associated Press writers Mary Clare Jalonick, Matt Brown and Farnoush Amiri contributed to this report.
