Sen. Ron Johnson doesn’t know when he will officially take over as chair of the Senate Budget Committee, a post left vacant by the sudden death Saturday of Sen. Lindsey Graham.
But the Wisconsin Republican is wasting no time getting ready.
“I’ve already met with Lindsey’s staff this afternoon,” Johnson said soon after arriving at the Capitol on Monday.
He acknowledged the gravity of his longtime colleague’s loss and said he understood the need to “take one step at a time.” But he also said he is hoping to quickly pick up where Graham left off on a new party-line budget reconciliation bill — something Johnson has advocated for more than a year and is now getting a fresh push from President Donald Trump.
The president wants the legislation to send $350 billion to the Pentagon and enact a litany of other GOP priorities ahead of the midterm elections.
While Graham was keen on delivering the defense funding by hook or by crook, Johnson is a veteran deficit hawk who told reporters Monday evening that identifying the maximum number of spending offsets “would certainly be one of my objectives” for the developing legislation.
Johnson said he is already in ongoing talks with House Budget Chair Jodey Arrington (R-Texas), who is planning to advance a fiscal blueprint for the GOP-only bill as soon as this week. Some Republicans are eyeing billions of dollars in savings from targeting purported fraud in Medicare, Medicaid and other social programs to offset any new spending.
Johnson said he hasn’t seen a draft of the House budget blueprint, which must be adopted in both chambers to unlock the party-line reconciliation process, but expects to be in touch with Arrington and White House officials as the process progresses.
“It’s a team sport,” he said. “I just want to do everything I can to organize the effort so we can succeed.”
Johnson said he is also vetting a House proposal related to voter-ID legislation from Rep. Bryan Steil, the fellow Wisconsin Republican who leads the House panel overseeing election matters. If found to comply with strict reconciliation rules, it could serve to partially sidestep the Democratic filibuster of the SAVE America Act — the GOP elections bill that Trump has repeatedly pushed Congress to pass.
“I’ve already given that to Budget Committee staff to kind of get their opinion on it,” Johnson said of Steil’s proposal. “I mean, in the end, it’s going to be the parliamentarian that rules.”
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