Speaker Mike Johnson is scrambling to negotiate with competing factions of his conference as the clock ticks to advance President Donald Trump’s agenda through the House next week.

Here’s a sampling of what each group is gunning for:

THE SALT-IES: The so-called SALT Republicans are at an impasse with GOP leadership over the state-and-local-tax deduction.

House Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith (R-Mo.) told reporters Wednesday there’s only about $50 billion to work with — putting Johnson in a difficult spot to placate the mostly blue-state members who are pushing to beef up the $30,000 cap currently in the bill.

“The window is closing” for a deal, said Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-N.Y.), a SALT and Ways and Means member. “The closer to Memorial Day we get, the low-sodium diets of many of my colleagues on Ways and Means is growing.”

THE HARD-LINERS: Conservatives are livid that the current language in the GOP megabill doesn’t start work requirements for Medicaid until 2029. (It’s one of the many ways Trump’s megabill would dish out the perks now and postpone the pain.)

Johnson wouldn’t comment when asked if he’d be open to their demands to begin the work requirements earlier: “We have lots of discussions ahead,” he said.

The speaker will meet with a cross-section of these two warring groups at 10 a.m. in his office.

THE CLEAN ENERGY MODS: More than a dozen House Republicans are pushing to undo a rollback of Inflation Reduction Act clean energy credits. Led by Rep. Jen Kiggans (R-Va.), the Republicans warned in a statement that an abrupt stop of the tax credits, implementation of new restrictions and changes to provisions that help fund projects could smother investments in new energy technologies.

However, they’re up against hard-liners pushing for even greater rollbacks of clean energy credits. Some want a full repeal.

THE MEDICAID MODS: A group of Republican centrists not on Energy and Commerce were surprised by some of the Medicaid provisions included in the committee-passed bill.

One area of concern is over a requirement for some Medicaid beneficiaries with incomes at or just above the poverty line to start paying for a portion of their care.

“That was a new element that … had not been discussed with us before,” GOP Rep. Ryan Mackenzie (Pa.) told POLITICO. The group of centrists plan to meet with Johnson on Thursday morning.

Watch for whether House GOP leaders make progress in various meetings Thursday and during their conference-wide reconciliation meeting at 2:30 p.m. The megabill then heads to the Budget Committee on Friday and the Rules Committee next week.

Want your own reconciliation briefing? Request an invite to our Policy Intelligence Briefing happening today from 2–3 p.m with our Jennifer Scholtes, Ben Leonard, Meredith Lee Hill and Benjamin Guggenheim. Pro subscribers should have already received an invite.

What else we’re watching:

— SNAP cuts are in, for now: House Agriculture advanced legislation down party lines on Wednesday night that would cut up to $300 billion in food aid spending to pay for Republicans’ domestic policy megabill and some farm programs. But Chair John Boozman (R-Ark.) quickly released a statement hinting that the SNAP cost-share plan might not fly in the Senate.

— Will the crypto bill return next week?: Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Wednesday that the upper chamber is unlikely to begin considering landmark cryptocurrency legislation again this week as negotiators close in on a deal. “They’re still working at it,” Thune told reporters Wednesday afternoon, though he left the door open to floor action next week.

— Child online safety bill is back: Sens. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) reintroduced a popular kids online safety bill after successful industry efforts to kill the legislation last year. The Kids Online Safety Act, a measure that would require social media companies to design their platforms with more safety guardrails for children, stalled last time after House leaders balked over free speech concerns. But Johnson has promised this Congress will pass legislation to make online spaces safer for kids.

Jordain Carney, Jasper Goodman, Meredith Lee Hill, Ben Leonard, Ruth Reader, Josh Siegel, Jennifer Scholtes and Grace Yarrow contributed to this report.

GOP staff for the the House Agriculture Committee is warning industry groups that they need to get behind the panel’s megabill package of $300 billion in nutrition spending cuts or risk getting nothing from the $60 billion in farm bill investments also included in the proposal.

Trevor White, the committee’s policy director, sent an email to agriculture lobbying groups encouraging them to make “statements of support” and conduct “direct outreach to members off the committee” to ensure that the farm bill programs survive the reconciliation process.

“With the current budget environment, once this train leaves the station, if these investments are NOT included, it is hard to see a path forward for the remaining pieces of the farm bill,” White said in the email sent Tuesday that was viewed by POLITICO.

House Agriculture Chair G.T. Thompson (R-Pa.) told reporters recently that he still feels “positive” about being able to pass a separate farm bill to update policies that didn’t make it into the megabill central to enacting broad swaths of President Donald Trump’s domestic agenda. But White’s comments are the latest indication that hopes of securing a new farm bill this year are fading fast.

Thompson has also said that he wants to spearhead a “skinny,” budget-neutral farm bill later this year, if Republicans can pass the expensive farm safety net programs through the filibuster-skirting budget reconciliation process. However, Democrats have threatened that the cuts to SNAP spending being pursued as part of the the GOP’s party-line package will mean they won’t support a separate farm bill this year.

“Chairman Thompson looks forward to working with the Ranking Member and our Senate counterparts to move the remaining farm bill provisions after reconciliation,” committee spokesperson Ben Goldey said in a statement Wednesday.

White’s email also encouraged agriculture groups to reach out to lawmakers who aren’t on the House Agriculture Committee to encourage them to support the measure’s farm bill provisions. That pressure could be critical to helping those programs survive a full House vote, as some fiscal hawks typically vote against the major subsidies included in the farm bill.

“The survival of these investments beyond our committee should not be seen as a foregone conclusion,” White wrote. “If your organization would like to see these investments included as the process moves forward, the Chairman would greatly appreciate your help by making statements of support, but also direct outreach to members off the committee.”

He also asked groups to report supportive statements and lobbying efforts to committee staff.

More than a dozen House Republicans are urging party leaders to undo key rollbacks of Democrats’ clean energy credits that the Ways and Means Committee pushed through Wednesday as part of the party’s megabill.

Rep. Jen Kiggans (R-Va.) and 12 other moderate Republicans, warned in a statement that abruptly cutting off Inflation Reduction Act tax credits, imposing onerous restrictions and changing provisions that help fund projects more quickly could stifle investments in new energy technologies.

“We must ensure certainty for current and future energy investments to meet the nation’s growing power demand and protect our constituents from higher energy costs,” Kiggans said in the statement with Reps. Andrew Garbarino (R-N.Y.), Mark Amodei (R-Nev.), Juan Ciscomani (R-Ariz.), Dave Joyce (R-Ohio), Nick LaLota (R-N.Y.), Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.), Dan Newhouse (R-Wash.), David Valadao (R-Calif.), Gabe Evans (R-Colo.), Rob Bresnahan (R-Pa.), Don Bacon (R-Neb.) and Young Kim (R-Calif.).

The Republicans stopped short of vowing to reject the party-line package if it isn’t changed before it moves to the House floor, which leadership intends to do next week. But their pressure could give cover to Senate Republicans who have already pledged to ease some of the rollbacks once the bill moves to their chamber for consideration.

The House Republicans said the Ways and Means Committee’s rewrite of IRA credits includes “reasonable phase-out schedules,” but they called for three changes to provisions that they suggest could undermine the intent of the credits to grow energy production and manufacturing.

First, they said so-called foreign entities of concern requirements applied to various tax credits — which are intended to curtail the ability of Chinese companies to benefit from the subsidies — are “overly prescriptive and risk undermining U.S. competitiveness by restricting domestic energy production.”

Second, they criticized the Ways and Means Committee’s mandate that access to tax credits is available only once a project starts producing energy, as opposed to when construction starts, which they say risks projects not getting built in time to meet the scheduled phaseout.

And lastly, they pushed to enable businesses to buy and sell clean energy credits — an option known as transferability — for a longer period to match the full phaseout period for various credits to provide “businesses with the flexibility necessary to make long-term investments in American energy.”

The committee’s bill bans the practice after only two years.

Despite the unlikelihood of House leadership allowing these changes, Ways and Means Committee leaders are acknowledging the Senate could act as a backstop.

Ways and Means vice chair Rep. Vern Buchanan (R-Fla.), a defender of IRA clean energy credits, said in an interview Wednesday he hopes Senate Republicans will make changes to his committee’s rollback of incentives.

“There’s gonna be a lot of changes. It’s not over. We’re in the first quarter,” Buchanan said.

One of the most vulnerable Republicans in Congress and one of the most outspoken are feuding over the cap on state and local deductions in the GOP’s sweeping tax bill.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene struck first at Rep. Mike Lawler, noting his tenuous grip on his suburban New York seat and questioning why effort to help him and other Blue State Republicans with an increase in the SALT deduction.

Legislation released this week by the House Ways and Means Committee increased the cap on the state and local tax deduction to $30,000. But so-called SALT Republicans, including New Yorkers Lawler and Nick LaLota, aren’t satisfied. They’ve threatened to withhold their votes from the GOP’s domestic policy package.

“Mike Lawler has a toss up seat,” Greene wrote on X on Wednesday. “What’s the point in Republicans fighting to protect and keep re-electing ‘Republicans’ if they constantly undermine the agenda America voted for???”

Lawler’s reply was scathing.

“Shockingly the ‘Jewish Space Laser’ lady once again doesn’t have a clue what she is talking about,” he wrote in response. “By the way, the reason you enjoy a gavel is because Republicans like me have won our seats. Good luck being in the Majority if we don’t.”

Lawler has long been a critic of the Georgia Republican. In May 2024, he panned her effort to remove House Speaker Mike Johnson from his post overseeing the Republican Caucus, calling it “lunacy” and a “temper tantrum.”

“Here is Mike Lawler claiming HE gave us the majority NOT President Donald Trump!!!,” Greene wrote in a repost of Lawler’s comment. “Did you all vote for Mike Lawler and his agenda???”

In his response, Lawler played up his overperformance in New York’s swingy 17th district — and his importance to a caucus that rules by the slimmest of margins.

“I’m 1 of only 3 Republicans in a district won by Harris,” he wrote. “I know math is difficult, but: 220-3=217.”

Michigan Rep. Shri Thanedar chose not to follow through on a threat to force a House vote on impeaching President Donald Trump Wednesday amid mounting pressure from fellow Democrats.

Thanedar did not call up his resolution as expected at a Wednesday evening vote series, and the window for action has now passed.

“After talking with many colleagues, I have decided not to force a vote on impeachment today,” Thanedar confirmed in a text message. “Instead, I will add to my articles of impeachment and continue to rally the support of both Democrats and Republicans to defend the Constitution with me.”

Democrats privately fumed this week after Thanedar pressed forward with his impeachment effort at a moment where they are seeking to put a spotlight on Republicans’ potential cuts to Medicaid and other federal programs as the GOP moves closer to a floor vote on its massive tax-cut bill.

Although many Democrats believe that Trump has committed impeachable offenses — many voted to impeach him twice during his first term — they saw Thanedar’s measure as a sideshow during a crucial week on Capitol Hill.

Several lawmakers — including Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Greg Casar of Texas, Brad Schneider of Illinois and Jamie Raskin of Maryland — were spotted earlier in the day talking privately to Thanedar on the floor. Schneider emphasized the need to stay focused this week on the House GOP’s megabill, according to a person familiar with the situation who granted anonymity to describe the private conversation.

But Thanedar had insisted earlier Wednesday he would still force a vote.

Party leaders didn’t formally whip the impeachment measure, but Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar of California said they planned to vote to kill it.

Alaska’s lone House lawmaker says he supports Republicans’ plan to pay for their megabill by shifting some food aid costs to states — a move that hits Alaska and other states with high payment error rates disproportionately hard.

“I support states being in compliance with SNAP rules, and I think it’s healthy for states to be incentivized to ensure they are in compliance,” Rep. Nick Begich (R-Alaska) said when asked about the proposal Wednesday.

Begich is a freshman lawmaker who flipped Alaska’s only congressional seat red after defeating former Rep. Mary Peltola last fall.

Under the House Agriculture Committee’s plan, states will be forced to pay hundreds of billions of dollars for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program starting in fiscal year 2028. States with lower payment error rates will have to pay 5 percent of the cost of benefits. But states like Alaska that have payment error rates above 10 percent will have to pay 25 percent of the cost of benefits. All states will have to pay 75 percent of SNAP’s administrative costs.

Alaska, which already grapples with pockets of incredibly high food insecurity, and other state governments would have to decide whether to absorb the costs or cut benefits for low-income Americans.

GOP leaders have privately conveyed to members that the Senate is unlikely to approve the SNAP plan. It could also be held up in litigation.

A new report shows the House’s ethics watchdog received thousands of messages from the public during the first three months of 2025 — while it was prohibited from opening any investigations.

Those 4,131 communications included questions about the Office of Congressional Conduct and information about misconduct allegations, according to a report from the office.

On Tuesday, the House named four members to the OCC board, allowing the independent body to move to resume its formal investigations. The office will also begin to formally change its name from the Office of Congressional Ethics, as was required in the rules package for the 119th Congress.