Speaker Mike Johnson’s government funding plan, a six-month temporary government funding bill with new proof-of-citizenship requirements for voter registration, is set for a full House vote on Wednesday.
But there are a lot of roadblocks here, and there’s still a possibility that leaders yank it before it comes to the floor.
State of play: The measure can’t clear the House with only GOP votes given current levels of opposition. Nearly a dozen House Republicans are on the record saying they’ll vote against the speaker’s proposal.
And Democrats are unlikely to help, viewing the voting provision as a poison pill. Only one House Democrat, Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine), has indicated he’ll vote for it.
But Johnson is still forging ahead as planned. On Tuesday night, Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) was hospitalized in Washington after he suffered “stroke-like symptoms,” further shrinking Johnson’s margin for defections.
When asked Tuesday if he’d consider putting a “clean” stopgap spending bill up for a vote, without the voter registration language, Johnson kept his options open.
“I am not going to engage in conjecture or game out all the outcomes,” he told reporters.
Former President Donald Trump weighed in Tuesday to urge House Republicans to hold strong on the election provisions.
“If Republicans in the House, and Senate, don’t get absolute assurances on Election Security, THEY SHOULD, IN NO WAY, SHAPE, OR FORM, GO FORWARD WITH A CONTINUING RESOLUTION” Trump wrote on social media.
House Democrats are still corralling votes on the stopgap funding and election legislation bundle, but they’re signaling they’ll take a wait-and-see approach as opposition builds on the right.
“We are still finalizing our whip count, but I think the problem is on the Republican side, because their own conference is recognizing this bill is bad for veterans, bad for seniors, bad for the American people,” House Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) said in a brief interview. “And so we’ll see what they do with their votes for their own partisan bill.”
Five Democrats voted for the proof-of-citizenship requirements for voter registration when the legislation came up earlier this year, but only one of them, Golden, has publicly said he would vote for the combined legislation this time around. Others like Reps. Vicente Gonzalez (D-Texas) and Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) have indicated they are likely to oppose it.
Even if House Republicans can muster the votes to pass the short-term spending measure with the election language attached, it has no chance in the Democratic Senate. In both chambers, Democrats are against inclusion of the so-called SAVE Act, citing the fact that it’s already illegal for noncitizens to register to vote in federal elections.
There are just 19 days until government funding runs dry.
