Six months into Donald Trump’s presidency, Congress finally codified a small piece of the hundreds of billions of dollars his Department of Government Efficiency pinpointed as “waste.”
House Republicans gave final approval just after midnight Friday to Trump’s proposal to claw back $9 billion in public media and foreign assistance, greenlighting the Senate’s changes to the measure that will bake in proposed DOGE cuts to public media and foreign aid. The package now heads to the president’s desk.
The House’s 216-213 vote to clear the Senate-amended package comes less than 24 hours after the Senate voted to tweak the administration’s original proposal that would have cut an additional $400 million from the global AIDS fighting program, PEPFAR. Senate Republicans also added language vowing that certain food assistance programs would be protected, and staved off impacts to other food aid, maternal health, malaria and tuberculosis-related initiatives.
“This bill tonight is part of continuing that trend of getting spending under control. Does it answer all the problems? No. Nine billion dollars is a good start,” said House Majority Leader Steve Scalise.
Two House Republicans, Reps. Mike Turner of Ohio and Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, voted against the measure for the second time, having also opposed it when the House first voted on the package last month. But Republican Reps. Nicole Malliotakis of New York and Mark Amodei of Nevada flipped to “yes,” heartened by the Senate deal to strike the proposed cut to AIDS-prevention efforts.
The package was advanced in the House under a fast-track process: Instead of voting directly on the bill, lawmakers triggered passage by voting for a procedural measure that’s typically used to set up debate. It meant lawmakers would not have to take an additional vote.
It also helped House Republicans move quickly to pass the bill, which needed to be shipped to Trump’s desk by Friday night or the rescissions request would expire and the administration would be forced to spend the money as Congress originally intended.
This rescissions package is the first to succeed in more than 30 years, and it’s already causing trouble for the annual appropriations process just 10 weeks before the Sept. 30 deadline to reach a funding deal or launch a government shutdown.
In the Senate, where spending bills need 60 votes to pass, Republicans will need Democratic support to approve even a short-term funding patch to avoid a lapse in federal operations. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer already warned in a letter to his caucus earlier this month of consequences if Republicans continued to go it alone on government funding.
In the House, the chamber’s top Democratic appropriator, Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro, said Republicans’ approval of the clawbacks package was tantamount to “a rubber stamp on the Trump administration’s stealing” from the American people.
“This rescissions bill is another effort to subvert the Congress’ power of the purse,’” she said.
Meanwhile, White House budget chief Russ Vought said Thursday morning that another rescissions package is likely coming “soon” to Capitol Hill, setting up another chance for Republicans to vote to cancel funding passed on a bipartisan basis – and further inflame partisan tensions.
House Republicans also teed up a procedural measure earlier Thursday evening to trigger passage of a non-binding resolution expressing support for the release of documents related to late-disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
GOP leaders are promoting the measure, to be considered at a later date, as a release valve for rank and file lawmakers who wanted to vote on the matter but not actually go on record in favor of making materials public.
It was the culmination of a daylong scramble that delayed eventual passage of the rescissions bill.
Nicholas Wu and Mia McCarthy contributed to this report.
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