Donald Trump has a big speaking engagement Wednesday night — and there’s no telling whether he’ll help or hurt the GOP’s Capitol Hill agenda.
The president is slated to address House Republicans at the NRCC’s annual dinner — the day after Democrats flipped a Florida statehouse seat that includes his home at Mar-a-Lago.
The last time Trump addressed the GOP conference, earlier this month in Florida, he sparked a slew of headaches for his party by insisting on passage of a partisan elections bill that has little chance of becoming law.
This time could be no different. Trump has so far hardly delivered a ringing public endorsement of a potential deal to end the DHS shutdown he reportedly signed off on, and which congressional Republican leaders need him to back if it has a chance of passing in the coming days. He also has yet to intervene in a standoff between the two chambers over a housing affordability package Republicans want to use as a centerpiece of their midterm messaging.
Here’s what we’ll be listening for:
— DHS deal or no deal?: Trump could make or break a potential agreement to end the DHS shutdown, which got a cool reception Tuesday on Capitol Hill across the board even ahead of Democrats’ expected counteroffer Wednesday.
Part of the proposal Republicans brokered with the White House includes attempts to morph sections of the SAVE America Act into a party-line budget reconciliation bill. But many conservatives see that a cop out from having to pass the full GOP elections overhaul bill, which does not currently have the votes to overcome the Senate filibuster. The House Freedom Caucus called it “gaslighting.”
Republicans are also getting a reality check on whether pursuing another reconciliation effort is even feasible. While Republicans are vowing to plow ahead, many predict the treacherous process will ultimately fail.
Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), a Budget Committee member who chairs the Republican Steering Committee, predicted it would be “very difficult” to get the votes for reconciliation and compared it to a “pipe dream.”
— Housing stalemate: For weeks, Republicans have wanted the president to help resolve the impasse between the House and Senate over their competing housing proposals.
The stalemate doesn’t appear close to resolution, especially if Trump continues to stay out of the fight. House Republicans on Tuesday shot down one idea the Senate floated to get the House to accept its legislation. It would have attached a slate of community bank deregulatory bills to a separate cryptocurrency package.
“So our good stuff for their bad stuff — not sure I buy that,” said Rep. Bill Huizenga (R-Mich.), who serves as vice chair of House Financial Services.
Despite Trump insisting earlier that Republicans don’t need to show they’re committed to lowering costs of everyday goods and services to win elections in November, plenty of GOP lawmakers worry about the political price of failing to enact a unified vision for making housing more affordable.
What else we’re watching:
— No polymarket for politicians?: Reps. Nikki Budzinski (D-Ill.) and Adrian Smith (R-Neb.) will introduce bipartisan legislation Wednesday morning to prohibit members of Congress, the president, the vice president and others in the executive branch from trading in certain prediction markets, according to bill text shared exclusively with POLITICO.
The Preventing Real-time Exploitation and Deceptive Insider Congressional Trading Act, or PREDICT Act, would also extend to dependents and spouses of lawmakers, senior congressional staff, political appointees and senior executive branch employees, including special government employees.
— Bipartisan energy in tax policy: The House Ways and Means Committee will mark up five bills with cross-party appeal Wednesday morning as Hill tax writers consider what policies might be included in a year-end bipartisan tax package. Among the items on a docket is a measure that would allow taxpayers to temporarily write off disaster-related losses without itemizing their deductions.
Katherine Tully-McManus, Jennifer Scholtes, Jordain Carney, Meredith Lee Hill, Jasper Goodman and Bernie Becker contributed to this report.
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