BUDGET LATEST — Speaker Mike Johnson is shopping around a revised House budget proposal, our Rachael Bade and Meredith Lee Hill scooped overnight. The new plan, which essentially sidelines House Budget Chair Jodey Arrington, would cut less spending than ultra-conservatives want while also scaling back potential tax cuts. POLITICO Pro readers got the news first. Sign up here.
IN TODAY'S EDITION:
Dems not seeking shutdown
Johnson faces House GOP with budget plan
Blue Dogs offer tax help
It's unclear if Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is willing to pull the trigger on a shutdown if the GOP doesn't work to rein in President Donald Trump's war on the federal government. | Jemal Countess/Getty Images for MoveOn
The Democratic Party's base is demanding that lawmakers do more to counter Donald Trump. But Democrats are signaling they don’t want to use their major leverage point — forcing a government shutdown if the GOP refuses to rein in the president’s war on the federal government.
“My folks don't want to shut down,” said Rep. Sanford Bishop, a senior appropriator.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal insisted his party needed to “use whatever levers and points of power we have” to extract concessions from the Trump administration. But he added: “I don't think we should seek a shutdown.”
A spending bill to avert a government shutdown by the March 14 deadline is the one, must-pass piece of legislation that Republicans need Democrats’ help to get over the finish line in the immediate future. Democrats can promise to hold Trump and the GOP accountable through investigations, protests and messaging bills, but none of those things have much bite in the minority.
Still, triggering a shutdown is a tricky card to play, as our Rachael details in her latest Corridors column: You can’t win a shutdown fight if you’re taking the political blame for the shutdown.
At least one Democrat is opening that door: First-term Sen. Andy Kim said Democrats may be willing to shut down the government over what he called Trump’s “lawlessness” during an interview with NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday.
But Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer didn’t lean in that much in a subsequent letter to his colleagues Monday morning, saying Republicans would need to work with Democrats to avoid a “Trump shutdown.” Democrats haven’t publicly indicated specific policy concessions they want in return for help passing spending bills, besides mandating no more federal funding freezes.
Rep. Jim McGovern, the top Democrat on the Rules Committee, said Monday evening, said “we don’t want to see the government shut down.” But if Republicans don’t want to work with Democrats on a bipartisan federal spending deal, “they’re on their own.”
— Republicans and Democrats will have their separate weekly conference meetings at 9 a.m.
— GOP leaders hold their post-meeting press conference at 10 a.m.
— Ways and Means will have a hearing to analyze the return on investment from Democrats’ additional IRS spending in the Inflation Reduction Act and the need to modernize the agency at 10 a.m., and then another hearing on modernizing American health care at 2 p.m.
— Homeland Security will hold a hearing on Chinese investments in ports across the Western Hemisphere and potential implications for U.S. security at 10 a.m.
— Judiciary will have a hearing on concerns about the administrative state, particularly agency rulemaking procedures, at 10 a.m.
— Natural Resources will have a hearing on reopening offshore oil and gas drilling at 10:15 a.m.
— Democratic leaders hold their post-meeting press conference at 11 a.m.
— The Republican StudyCommittee will meet at 12:30 p.m.
— Oversight will have a hearing on the growth of welfare programs in the United States and potential changes at 1:30 p.m.
— Financial Services will have a hearing on the current uses of digital assets and how that could affect the economy at 2:30 p.m.
The Senate is in session.
— Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs will have Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell testify on the semi-annual Monetary Policy Report at 10 a.m.
— Finance will vote on approving Jamieson Greer as United States Trade Representative ambassador at 11:30 a.m.
— Senators will hold weekly conference lunches at 12:30 p.m.
— Intel will have a closed meeting followed by a closed briefing at 2:30 p.m.
The rest of the week: The House will vote later in the week on a bill that would allow lawmakers to more easily roll back federal rules under the Congressional Review Act and a bill that would criminalize the act of fleeing from border patrol agents. The Senate is expected to vote on confirming Tulsi Gabbard for director of national intelligence in an early Wednesday vote, and then move to consider Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for HHS secretary, Howard Lutnick for secretary of Commerce, Brooke Rollins for Agriculture secretary and Kelly Loeffler to be administrator of the SBA.
A message from Meta:
Open source AI is available to all, not just the few.
Meta's open source AI, Llama, is free to use – enabling startups like Nanome to build an AI tool that helps scientists find new treatments for diseases.
Now, pharmaceutical research that may take years and cost billions can be done more efficiently.
Speaker Mike Johnson will face the House GOP Tuesday morning without a budget blueprint. | Francis Chung/POLITICO
Johnson’s budget plan
Johnson is quietly shopping a budget blueprint as he goes into the House GOP conference meeting today. His latest plan includes a new floor for spending cuts — between $1.25 trillion and $1.5 trillion — to offset part of the massive domestic policy package Republicans are now pursuing, according to four people granted anonymity to provide details on the private talks told Rachael and Meredith. That range of reductions is greater than what the speaker initially laid out to his conference last month but still lower than the $2.5 trillion some conservatives have been pushing for. Johnson needs near-total GOP unity to pass a budget reconciliation bill through the House.
John Thune’s budget timeline
Senate Republicans are largely ready to move their budget blueprint out of committee this week — but it's still unclear when they'll bring it to the floor, the next critical step for enacting Trump's domestic agenda. The Senate majority leader indicated they could bring it up as soon as next week, but noted he needs to find "windows and availability of floor time" around confirming Trump's nominees, our Jordain Carney reports.
Not all Republicans are on the same page here. Sen. James Lankford said the Senate's budget resolution was a Plan B, telling Benjamin Guggenheim that senators "will continue to wait on the House." Yet Sen. John Hoeven said “the planned timeline right now” was to "do the floor next week.”
SPENDING TALKS CONTINUE — Congress’ top appropriators gathered Monday night with the shutdown deadline about a month away and still no deal. It typically takes at least a month to negotiate final funding bills once a “topline” agreement is reached on overall spending totals. The House’s top Democratic appropriator, Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro said in a brief interview Monday night that “the vibe amongst the four of us is good” and they’re “moving.”
“I’m not setting arbitrary deadlines. But sooner is always better,” House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole said in a brief interview Monday night.
FIRST IN INSIDE CONGRESS: BLUE DOGS HAVE A TAX ASK — The Blue Dog Coalition, a contingent of centrist House Democrats, wants to help Johnson and Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith with a “targeted extension” of the GOP’s 2017 tax cuts, according to a letter our Nicholas Wu exclusively obtained.
The group of 10 Democrats led by Rep. Lou Correa added that the extension of the tax cuts should be paid for with spending cuts and increased revenue. Not all members backed the idea: Reps. Josh Gottheimer, Mike Thompson and Henry Cuellar didn’t sign the letter. While it’s notable that some Democrats are offering to help, the GOP is set on doing this in their party-line bill — at least for now.
ETHICS DIRECTOR REMOVED — Trump removed Government Office Director David Huitema from his position on Monday. It came the same day as Sen. Adam Schiff sent him a letter asking Huitema to verify Elon Musk’s compliance with federal conflict of interest and ethics requirements in Musk’s capacity as a “special government employee.”
ENDOWMENT FIGHT SPURS HIRING FRENZY: The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has hired S-3 Group to lobby on tax policy as higher education works to avoid becoming a pay-for in Republicans’ reconciliation plans. Marty Reiser, a former aide to House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, began lobbying on behalf of the university on Jan. 13, alongside John Scofield, Ashley Davis, Jose Ceballos, Chris Buki and Shimmy Stein, according to a disclosure filing.
Ryan McManus and Tommy Reynolds are now directors of government relations at Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions. Reynolds previously was legislative director for Rep. Buddy Carter.
Stuart Styron is now a senior fellow at SeedAI. He previously was senior technology policy counsel to former Rep. Anna Eshoo.
SpaceX last month hired Williams & Jensen’s Chris Brinson, the former chief of staff to House Armed Services Chair Mike Rogers, to lobby on “national security launch issues,” according to a disclosure filing.
JOB BOARD
Jamie Wise is returning to the House Appropriations Committee as a professional staff member.
House Energy and Commerce Committee Democrats brought on Parul Desai to be the new chief counsel of the Communications and Technology Subcommittee. Johanna Thomas was promoted to senior counsel on the C&T Subcommittee.
Greta Gao will be chief counsel and senior adviser for House Judiciary Committee Democrats. She previously was acting deputy assistant attorney general at the Department of Justice’s Office of Legislative Affairs.
Lauren Chou is joining the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee as comms director.
Mitch Heidenreich is joining Rep. Dave Min’s office as legislative director.
James Galkowski is now a professional staff member on the House Appropriations Committee. He is a Trump White House alum.
A message from Meta:
Open source AI is available to all, not just the few.
Meta's open source AI, Llama, is free to use – enabling startups like Zauron Labs to collaborate with universities and build an AI tool that's like a spellchecker for radiologists.
Now, radiologists have more ways to reduce the 4% error rate in the 3 billion imaging exams done each year – potentially improving outcomes for millions of patients.
Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) … POLITICO’s Grace Yarrow and Evan Lehmann … Jimmy Dahman … Alex Conant … James Hewitt … Kyle Buckles … Evan Siegfried … Will Smith of Cornerstone Government Affairs … Nicole L’Esperance … Brian Kaveney ... Andrea Mares … Hannah Lindow … Emily Kirlin of Tiber Creek Group … Jess Sarmiento … former Rep. Rob Woodall (R-Ga.) … Jamie Logan of the American Cleaning Institute … Alejandro Rosenkranz … Amy Blunt of Husch Blackwell Strategies
TRIVIA
MONDAY’S ANSWER: Bill Geary correctly answered that South Carolina senators Benjamin Ryan Tillman and John Lowndes McLaurin were both censured for physically fighting each other on the Senate floor during a debate over the annexation of the Philippines.
TODAY’S QUESTION, from Bill: Name a former Kansas City Chief who ran for Congress and lost; name a former Philadelphia Eagle who ran for Congress and won.
The first person to correctly guess gets a mention in the next edition of Inside Congress. Send your answers to insidecongress@politico.com.
