Congress
House Freedom Caucus plans to throw another tax plan into the mix
House Freedom Caucus Chair Andy Harris (R-Md.) said Tuesday that the group would be releasing its own plan this week for achieving President Donald Trump’s tax priorities.
The plan, which the hard-right HFC wants to take up after a separate bill addressing border and defense initiatives, is a new speed bump in Speaker Mike Johnson‘s effort to unite fractious House Republicans around leadership’s own plan.
“The big tax bill is what we’re going to propose in our second step, and it’s going to be coupled with enough deficit reduction to make sure that the financial markets realize we’re serious about deficit reduction,” said Harris.
He cautioned that they wouldn’t necessarily be including all of Trump’s ideas, “because it’s unclear the president prioritizes all of them, but the ones that the president wants, plus the extension of the tax cuts, especially the ones that would result in economic growth.”
House leaders are scrambling to get GOP lawmakers to coalesce around their own plan for a single bill that would include border, energy and tax policies. The Freedom Caucus openly defied leadership by releasing its own plan focused on border and defense on Monday.
Harris’ announcement that the caucus would subsequently release a tax plan is similarly a snub to House Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith (R-Mo.), who as head of the tax-writing committee is responsible for compiling Trump’s tax priorities.
Meanwhile, GOP leaders indicated Tuesday morning that their plan could be taken up by the House Budget Committee as soon as Thursday, though significant questions remain about the tax portion of the sweeping agenda.
Specifically, lawmakers expect that Johnson’s new draft plan, outlined by POLITICO on Monday, will include a budget reconciliation instruction for Ways and Means that would dip below $4.7 trillion in deficit spending. That would barely give the committee enough breathing room to extend all the 2017 Trump tax cuts that are expiring at the end of this year, which the Congressional Budget Office estimates will cost around $4.6 trillion — let alone Trump’s other tax priorities.
The House Freedom Caucus plan would include an instruction for Ways and Means that would range between $5 to $5.5 trillion. However, it’s unclear if the spending cuts the group includes in its plan to offset the tax policies’ impact on the deficit would be acceptable to the rest of the conference.
Harris said he hopes to file a complete budget blueprint within the next two weeks, which would call for an extension of the expiring tax cuts and Trump’s other ideas to eliminate taxes on tips and overtime pay.
The GOP agenda needs to include “real deficit reduction,” Harris said, coupled with economic growth assumptions for the tax cuts that aren’t “unrealistic.” Republican leaders argue that their tax plans will stimulate economic growth that would offset a portion of the cost, though fiscal hawks want to be conservative with those estimates.
House Freedom Caucus member Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) added that while the extension of Trump tax cuts would be permanent under the group’s plan, some proposals like ending the federal income tax on tips would likely need to be shorter-term to pare back the cost of the bill.
Pressure is mounting on House GOP leaders to get their agenda together as Senate Budget Committee Chair Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) prepares to mark-up the Senate’s plan on Wednesday. That bill would not include any of Trump’s tax agenda, saving that for a second measure later in the year.
“The question is, if they can’t come up to a resolution quickly, then again the House Freedom Caucus feels that they should do what the Senate is doing, pass a much smaller bill, get the president the border funds and some of the defense funds that he needs to secure the nation,” Harris said.
Meredith Lee Hill contributed to this report.
Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) has once again broken ranks with House Democratic leadership over endorsements, this time to support former Missouri Rep. Cori Bush over incumbent Rep. Wesley Bell.
In a post to social media Tuesday, Pressley called on voters to elect “champions” like Bush, who is in a heated primary rematch Tuesday in a contest that lays bare the party’s divide over Israel.
“Whether in Massachusetts, Michigan or Missouri, we all need politicians who fight for us, not corporations,” Pressley said. Her endorsement comes as voters head to the polls for primaries in both Michigan and Missouri, where progressive challengers are taking on moderate incumbents.
It marks the second time this primary cycle Pressley has endorsed against candidates backed by Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.). Last month, she joined a handful of other Congressional Black Caucus members to support Michigan state Rep. Donavan McKinney in his bid to unseat Democratic Rep. Shri Thanedar.
A spokesperson for Jeffries did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Pressley’s endorsement also sets her squarely against the establishment wing of the party: both Bush and McKinney have been endorsed by their local Democratic Socialists of America chapters.
But the endorsement is unsurprising: she and Bush served as members of the progressive “Squad” in the last Congress and often worked together on legislation. In a previous interview with POLITICO, Bush said she and Pressley continued to talk regularly, even after Bell unseated her in 2024.
Todd Blanche picked up an important GOP vote Tuesday for his nomination as attorney general — Sen. John Curtis of Utah — likely leaving him just one vote shy of securing confirmation.
Curtis said in a statement he plans to “support” Blanche and was pleased with the nominee’s “receptivity and understanding” of issues raised, including ending the “Anti-Weaponization Fund” created under a May settlement Blanche brokered between the IRS and President Donald Trump.
The announcement came moments after the Senate Judiciary Committee voted on party lines to advance Blanche’s nomination to the full Senate.
Crucial to that vote was Blanche agreeing in writing that the $1.8 billion payout fund was nullified and that another aspect of the settlement — an IRS audit immunity agreement — was scaled back. That gave GOP Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina enough comfort to vote for Blanche.
The remaining undecided Republican senators are Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. All three said Tuesday they are still grappling with their decisions.
“I’m still considering everything,” Collins said. “I watched part of the markup this morning to hear some of the statements, but I don’t have any decision to share with you right now.”
Murkowski declined to say how she would vote, and Cassidy told reporters that he had “nothing about Todd Blanche” to say.
Cornyn said he has already spoken with Collins and Murkowski and that additional conversations are expected.
“Senator Collins, she’s one of the most diligent individuals I know, certainly here in the United States Senate, and we had a good conversation.” Cornyn said. “She’ll have to speak for herself as to her ultimate conclusion. And I’ve also been exchanging messages with Senator Murkowski, and I know we’ll have further conversations about this.”
Jordain Carney and Calen Razor contributed to this report.
Democrats on the Budget Committee were frustrated by Sen. Ron Johnson’s (R-Wis.) first turn with the gavel after the new chair rebutted each of their remarks.
“Welcome to the chairmanship, but I find you are turning this into a debate committee and not a budget committee,” Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said during the Tuesday hearing on Medicaid.
Johnson, who took over chair after the unexpected passing of Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) last month, fact checked Democrats on the committee after their allotted question time, which got on the nerves of his colleagues.
Ranking Member Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) said near the end of the hearing that rebuttals by the chair aren’t “customary.”
Johnson, a frequent critic of the Medicaid program, defended his approach, which he said makes the hearings more “informative.” He sparred with Democrats on Tuesday over the impact of Medicaid cuts included in the 2025 One Big Beautiful Bill Act, as well as Medicaid fraud and spending growth.
“I keep my comments pretty short,” he said. “There are important points to be made, and I will continue to do that. I hope it doesn’t offend my Democratic colleagues, but that will be my contention here.”
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