Sweeping safety-net cuts have GOP centrists questioning Johnson's budget

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: Politico

02/14/2025 04:45 AM EST


Speaker Mike Johnson has cleared a major hurdle toward unlocking the massive, party-line bill he’s pursuing to enact President Donald Trump’s vast domestic agenda. Now he’s got more jumping to do. On Thursday, as Republican hard-liners celebrated a concession they won from party leaders to force deeper spending cuts as part of the GOP’s sweeping policy push, centrists expressed deep alarm about the trajectory of the massive legislation that will include border security, energy, defense and tax provisions. The emerging fault lines are many: GOP members in high-tax blue states are concerned that the plan doesn’t leave enough room to expand the state and local tax deduction.

And Senate Republicans and some House hard-liners aren’t ready to give up on a competing two-bill plan. But Johnson’s most immediate problem comes from swing-district Republicans who believe that the steep spending cuts Johnson wants across Medicaid, food assistance and other safety-net programs for low-income Americans could cost them their seats — and Johnson his razor-thin GOP majority. “I don’t know where they’re going to get the cuts,” said Rep. David Valadao, who represents a heavily Democratic district in central California, as he left the Capitol on Thursday.

The House Budget Committee cleared the fiscal blueprint for the massive policy bill on a party-line vote late Thursday night, and Johnson intends to bring it to the floor when the House returns from recess later this month. But with a two-vote majority, Johnson has virtually no room for error. And opposition from members like Valadao could force him and committee chairs to go back to the drawing board.

Low-key and soft-spoken, Valadao is the stylistic and ideological opposite of the fire-breathing hard-liners on Johnson’s right flank. His district in California’s Central Valley is one of the six Hispanic-majority GOP seats where more than 20 percent of households receive food aid benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which is being targeted under the GOP budget for some $230 billion in spending cuts.

Read more: https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/14/house-gop-budget-centrists-medicaid-00204223

[Bernardo de La Paz]

1. Republicon "mandate" razor thin but w House, Senate, & co-prez, they OWN it all & all results. . . . nt

[LonePirate]

2. Bullshit! Every one of these Republican centrists will enthusiastically vote for this bill.

[MayReasonRule]

3. The GOP Is Wholly Fascist - There Is No Such Thing As A Fascist Centrist

The so called 'centrists' are merely fascists that want to remain in power.

Every member of the GOP is a fascist because those that support the same are the same.

They're all the same.

[mountain grammy]

4. GOP Centrists do not exist..

[Martin68]

5. I see lots of pearl-clutching but no action from "concerned" GOPers.

[cstanleytech]

6. I'm kinda hoping they go ahead and do this sepaku if it would give us a 60+ Senate and 310 House.

Then with a Democrat as President the mess the Republicans are causing would get fixed as well as a number of other changes that are long past due. Such as a higher taxes on the wealthy until the promised trickle down from Reagan changes from the pissing they have been doing to all of us changes to potable water.