GOP’s lame-duck plans unravel after election drubbing

Republicans’ hopes of finishing a big chunk of President Trump’s agenda in the lame-duck session of Congress are rapidly deflating in the wake of the blowout losses their party suffered in Tuesday’s election, according to Republican aides on Capitol Hill.

Senate Republican sources say the bold talk before Election Day of ramming a budget reconciliation package through Congress to fund the Pentagon and the Iran war by circumventing a Democratic filibuster now seems unlikely after GOP candidates lost handily even in red states such as Texas, South Carolina and Kansas.

Vice President Vance has blamed the unpopularity of the war with Iran as the main reason for the GOP losses across the country, and Senate Republican sources acknowledge the conflict was a major drag on their party.

There’s a growing expectation among both Senate Republicans and Democrats that the annual funding bills, including money for the Defense Department, will get punted into 2027.

There’s rising concern that Congress’s 65-year streak of passing the National Defense Authorization Act is also in jeopardy.

Senate Republican sources are questioning whether permitting-reform legislation , which is scheduled to come to the floor next week, or the farm bill, a top priority of Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.), has any chance of passing Congress before Christmas now that Democrats are looking forward to big majorities in the Senate and House in January.

One senior GOP aide said the “logistics” of passing a budget resolution and a follow-up reconciliation package to fund the Pentagon and Trump’s emergency request for supplemental defense funding “is going to be difficult.”

“I don’t know if there’s an appetite there,” the source said, warning the annual defense authorization bill also faces an uphill climb.

Republican aides say that even if Thune and Senate Budget Committee Chair Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) are able to coalesce 50 Republican votes behind a budget reconciliation plan to fund defense priorities, it would consume weeks of floor time and face uncertain prospects in the House.

“I think the House is going to have some attendance problems, getting members back,” said a second senior GOP aide.

The source said there are strong doubts on the Senate side that House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) will be able to persuade all of his Republican colleagues to return to Washington for a six-week legislative sprint to finish Trump’s agenda after they got shellacked in Tuesday’s election.

House Republicans currently have a 218-seat majority, meaning it would take only a few absences to derail a budget reconciliation package, which wouldn’t receive votes from any Democrats.

Republicans fear that permitting-reform legislation, which appeared to have strong momentum at the end of September, may now also be in jeopardy after Democrats exceeded expectations by picking up at least seven Senate seats and at least 39 House seats.

One Republican aide on Thursday said “I’ll be surprised” if permitting reform passes.

The source pointed to comments Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) made on Wednesday questioning whether a final deal would be reached amid strong opposition to the bill from environmental groups.

Schumer appeared less bullish about the bill’s prospects than two key Democratic senators — Sens. Martin Heinrich (N.M.) and Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.) — sounded when Congress left town weeks ago for the preelection recess.

Asked about the permitting-reform bill that Senate Republican leaders want to pass in the lame-duck session, Schumer would only say he “hoped” the bipartisan working group would reach a final deal.

“We have a bipartisan group working on permitting reform, and hopefully they’ll come up” with a deal, he said.

A second GOP aide on Thursday said Schumer’s comments appeared to walk back Democratic enthusiasm for the legislation that the two lead Democratic negotiators, Heinrich and Whitehouse, touted as a major accomplishment just a few weeks ago.

“Whitehouse and Heinrich said there was a deal,” the aide said. Whitehouse is the ranking member on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, and Heinrich serves as ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

Senate Republicans had warned in September there was a danger that Democratic support for the emerging compromise would evaporate if floor action on the measure was delayed until after the election.

Frustrated Republicans say that if Democrats walk away from the legislation it would be a shame because it could delay an eventual deal on permitting reform for months — or longer — in the next Congress, if it even happens.

Republican and Democratic aides are more pessimistic about getting a deal on a year-end omnibus appropriations package to fund the government through fiscal 2027 in the next few weeks.

Government funding is due to expire on Dec. 11, and Democrats say the Senate Appropriations Committee is well behind schedule, as the committee’s chair, Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), who was defeated by Democratic challenger Troy Jackson in Tuesday’s election, hasn’t yet released any drafts of the Republican appropriations bills.

Democrats say that Trump’s insistence on spending a total of $1.5 trillion on defense while hardly increasing funding for nondefense social programs had effectively derailed this year’s appropriations process.

Democratic and Republican sources say it would be very difficult to put together a broader deal on the annual appropriations bills in the next few weeks with Trump agreeing to give Democrats major concessions.

The growing consensus among Senate Democratic and Republican sources is that Congress will be forced to pass another short-term government funding measure to keep federal departments and agencies operating through March.

That would give the new Democratic Senate and House majorities time to put together their own appropriations bills in time for floor votes in late March or April.

“I would anticipate a CR,” said a senior GOP aide, referring to a short-term continuing resolution to fund the government until late March or mid-April.

The aide said Collins and other Republicans on the Appropriations Committee would like to pass an emergency supplemental appropriations package attached to the stopgap funding measure, but they don’t know if Democrats will agree to that.

“I think there’s going to be a desire to do some sort of an appropriations,” the source said. “I think Collins has a real desire to get it done at this point of time. I foresee a CR until March.”

Democrats are signaling that Republican leaders would have to agree to a very good deal if any package of regular year-long appropriations bills is to pass before Jan. 1.

Senate Republicans are also working on a package of Trump nominees to confirm before they lose control of the upper chamber. But even that will consume valuable floor time as it will require Republicans to first pass a resolution to set up the floor procedure and then a follow-up vote on the package itself.