Speaker Mike Johnson projected confidence he has the votes to adopt the Senate’s budget resolution Thursday morning, after House conservatives threw the effort into chaos Wednesday night.
He’ll be put to the test during a vote Thursday morning.
“I’m happy to tell you that this morning, I believe we have the votes to finally adopt the budget resolution,” Johnson told reporters. “So we can move forward on President Trump’s very important agenda for the American people.”
Johnson, standing with Senate Majority Leader John Thune, reaffirmed his commitment to finding $1.5 trillion in spending cuts as leaders move forward with the reconciliation process.
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Thune presented a united front with Johnson, while leaving some uncertainty about what exactly his senators will do.
“Our ambition in the Senate is we are aligned with the House in terms of what their budget resolution outlined, in terms of savings,” Thune said. “The speaker’s talked about $1.5 trillion dollars. We have a lot of United States senators who believe that is a minimum, and we’re certainly going to do everything we can to be as aggressive as possible.”
The commitments from leadership show just how much influence the conservative wing of the House Republican caucus has over President Donald Trump’s agenda. Trump himself was actively trying to persuade members to vote for the Senate framework this week, publicly calling on them to “stop grandstanding.” Passing a budget framework is just the starting point for Republicans to move Trump’s broad policy agenda through a reconciliation bill — which, for now, has a self-imposed Memorial Day deadline.
Multiple sources told NOTUS that while they don’t think every holdout is fully on board yet, they believe Johnson can get them over the line following this press conference.
Johnson and his Republican leadership team met with the holdouts off the House floor for nearly an hour late into Wednesday night, trying to convince them to support the Senate-adopted framework. Nearly a dozen conservatives — most in the House Freedom Caucus — said they wouldn’t support the Senate plan.
Throughout the meeting — which lasted until about 10:30 p.m. — staffers brought their bosses dinner to the ceremonial room just off the House floor. Members filed out one by one, saying very little, if anything, on the record.
But while some of the holdouts were clear they were still a no, they said they were open to supporting the Senate measure if they got the commitments about cutting the national deficit by $1.5 to 2 trillion, which was what was laid out in the House version of the budget framework lawmakers adopted earlier this year.
Senior aides told NOTUS they were optimistic that they will still be able to adopt the budget by the end of Thursday.
“You know me, I’m always hopeful,” Johnson told reporters late Wednesday night after he pulled the vote on the measure.
Ahead of the press conference, Trump posted on Truth Social that “‘The Big, Beautiful Bill’ is coming along really well. Republicans are working together nicely. Biggest Tax Cuts in USA History!!! Getting close.”
Johnson told reporters he was keeping Trump current on everything, though in the meetings, the president didn’t speak to the entire group of holdouts.
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Daniella Diaz, Riley Rogerson and Reese Gorman are reporters at NOTUS. Ben T.N. Mause is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.
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