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Thune pitches ambitious reconciliation timeline

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Curtis, Slotkin talk bipartisanship and priorities going into Senate

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Thune pitches ambitious reconciliation timeline

Happy Tuesday afternoon.

News: Incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Tuesday that he wants to pass a reconciliation package within the first 30 days of Donald Trump taking office.

Thune told GOP senators at a closed-door policy retreat that the measure, which he described as “highly impactful,” would include non-tax policy items like border security, defense and energy.

This is a highly ambitious timeline, and it will be difficult to convince the Senate parliamentarian that all of these provisions would fall under the reconciliation rules. Republicans have expressed confidence about satisfying the parliamentarian, arguing Democrats expanded the scope of reconciliation in the last Congress.

This timeline would give Republicans additional time to do a separate reconciliation package centered on the Trump tax cuts, which will expire at the end of 2025 absent congressional action.

Separating some of the GOP’s other policy priorities from a tax bill next year could make extending Trump’s signature tax-cut law simpler.

One of the major potential limits on Republicans’ ambitions will be offsets — depending on how much of a reconciliation package they decide to pay for. Republicans have been discussing what sort of deficit impact they think lawmakers in the party will stomach, especially given the House’s razor-thin majority.

Big changes afoot: Thune warned GOP senators that the first few months of 2025 could include longer days and weeks than they’re used to, citing the possibility that Democrats will try to jam up the Senate floor on Trump’s Cabinet nominees or other Senate business.

And Thune said he would “modernize” the work week longer-term to include voting on Fridays. The Senate, of course, has been pretty religious with its Monday-to-Thursday schedule, so this would represent a significant change.

Thune also told Republicans that votes will no longer be held open indefinitely, which has been a common practice lately. Votes are often held open for more than an hour, which enables individual senators to take other meetings.

More from inside the room: The more immediate focus, Thune told Republicans, will be passing a government funding bill before the Dec. 20 deadline, as well as the annual defense authorization bill and a disaster relief supplemental.

And he promised that the Senate would return to regular order when it considers everything from appropriations to the defense bill to Congressional Review Act measures in 2025.

Trump also called into the meeting at the outset and spoke briefly to the group, though he didn’t get into any substantive issues, sources in the room told us.

— Andrew Desiderio and Laura Weiss

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Curtis, Slotkin talk bipartisanship and priorities going into Senate

As the 118th Congress winds down, two Problem Solvers Caucus members are preparing to move up to the Senate. Sens.-elect John Curtis (R-Utah) and Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) joined us Tuesday morning to discuss how they intend to approach bipartisanship in a Republican Senate with tight margins.

Trump nominees: Hill watchers are keeping a close eye on Curtis, who many view as a likely swing vote on some of President-elect Donald Trump’s more controversial Cabinet nominations.

Curtis said he’d let the process play out, adding that some of those nominations will resolve themselves before it’s time to vote, citing former Rep. Matt Gaetz’s (R-Fla.) attorney general nomination that imploded quickly.

“I think what’s easy to forget is there is an amazing process in place and this process evolves over time, and there’s a lot of look into people’s backgrounds and things they’ve said,” Curtis said. “So I’m trying to be very disciplined and let the process work.”

Bipartisanship: Working across the aisle can be an uphill battle, Slotkin said. The Michigan Democrat also said it’s hard to get attention for cooperating with the other party.

“Bipartisanship is like deeply unsexy to people,” Slotkin quipped.

Slotkin said she asked at a Senate orientation session if there were bipartisan caucuses in the upper chamber. Incumbent senators told her that since there are so few of them, there are more opportunities to work together.

“We can be normal,” Slotkin said. “We just need to be more deliberate, because I think the country needs to see it.”

Slotkin and Curtis are hopeful their parties will work together on some key areas, including rural broadband, prescription drug price reform and helping veterans.

Permitting reform: Both lawmakers agreed that the United States’ protracted and complicated process for greenlighting energy and infrastructure projects needs to be urgently overhauled.

Curtis in particular said he plans to spend a lot of time focusing on the issue in the Senate.

“The low-hanging fruit is permitting reform and everybody’s talking about it. Everybody knows how important it is,” Curtis said. “If you want to talk IRA, a lot of those dollars are locked down because of permitting reform.”

Bringing civility to Congress: Slotkin said for Congress to work better together, it needs to reflect the values that are expected of children.

“I think that the most important thing is for people to emulate the behavior that we teach our kids in school, which is ‘treat each other with respect, even when you disagree,’” Slotkin said. “Do that in public, do that in private, do that on social media.”

Ending on a hopeful note, Curtis said, “The more time we spend together, the more we get along, and the more we find solutions.”

Fireside chat: Following our bipartisan conversation with Curtis and Slotkin, Sam Mar, a senior adviser at Arnold Ventures, joined us for a fireside chat on bipartisanship.

Mar agreed with the lawmakers that permitting reform is an important priority that deserves bipartisan attention.

“I think all of us can agree that we as a country, especially when it comes to energy… when it comes to building infrastructure, we need to get better at building things on time and on budget,” Mar said.

Mar also said he’s excited about the prospect of making government more efficient. He also echoed the need for Congress to work together with a simple call: “Be bipartisan.”

Mar added, “You need friends on both sides of the aisle because in order for any policy solution to endure those swings of power, you really need to find friends on both sides of the aisle.”

— Robert O’Shaughnessy

… AND THERE’S MORE

House approps. Rep. Mike Levin (D-Calif.) is seeking a spot on the House Appropriations Committee. Levin, a Frontliner who just won a competitive reelection race, made his case in this letter to the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee.

Great primer. If you love the House like we do, you will love this podcast. Brendan Buck and Annalyse Keller interview Tom Wickham, the former House parliamentarian. Wick, as he is known to many, is the foremost expert on the rules and procedures of the House of Representatives. They talk about reconciliation – Wick thinks that it may be possible for Republicans to include “more dollars” for the border wall, technology and border personnel in the reconciliation bill. Listen to the pod.

– Jake Sherman and Max Cohen

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