The view from Washington: navigating divides and power struggles in Congress

This is the fifth in an occasional series on the transition from Biden to the Trump administration—the early days. You can read part one, two, three, four and six here.

The first test of Republican solidarity was the election of House Speaker. Although encountering turbulence, Speaker Johnson (R-LA) was re-elected on the first vote. Trump backed Johnson, but he’s on thin ice with some of the more conservative members of the GOP House conference. Although he still holds the gavel, his grip is less secure than in the 118th Congress.

Johnson’s troubles, however, are just beginning. House budget hawks are circling and have promised to act up if substantial cuts in federal spending are not made. They’ll have plenty of opportunity to make good on those threats over the next several months.

Johnson has the smallest House majority in almost a century to work with. At present, the vote margin is one. Even after vacancies are filled through special elections, the Republicans will only have 220 votes to the Democrats 215. For the GOP, that's two fewer than in the previous Congress.

Republican congressional leaders and the president-elect are trying to decide how best to act on Trump’s America First Agenda. Because of the slim majorities and the ability of Senate Democrats to filibuster legislation brought up for a vote in the normal course of business, Republicans are looking to use a procedure called Budget Reconciliation. It allows the passage of federal budget legislation by a simple majority vote.

Senate rules permit the filibusters. To close down a filibuster requires a super majority of 60 votes. Reconciliation was how the Democrats passed the Inflation Reduction Act.

There are complex rules about what can be included in a reconciliation package. The procedure is subject to the Byrd Rule, which "prevents reconciliation bills from becoming a way to pass policy changes that aren't related to the federal budget.”

The interpreter of the reconciliation rules is the Senate Parliamentarian, a non-partisan position. The Parliamentarian's ruling is not law, although it generally determines what is in the ultimate legislation.

"The process begins when the House and Senate Budget Committees include instructions in the annual budget resolution. These instructions tell other committees to develop legislation that affects spending, revenues, or the debt limit. The legislation is then considered by the full House or Senate.”

The process can take many months depending on the ability of the majority party to pass the resolution, get committee numbers, find enough votes in the House to pass it on to the Senate and for the Parliamentarian to pass judgment and for the Senate vote and send it on to the president.

The problem for the GOP is whether to package all of Trump’s America First Agenda—from border security to the extension of his 2017 tax credits—in one or two reconciliation bills. The president-elect has indicated his preference for one big, beautiful bill.

Speaker Johnson also favors a single bill. He reasons that a single bill would have something in it for everyone. Johnson believes that if everyone has something to gain, objections won't be raised for fear of losing.

Thune and most senators have a contrary view. They believe a loaded bill will trigger the most conservative members of the House and Senate to see the legislation as profligate spending because it's estimated that Trump's agenda would add significantly to the national debt—without substantial spending cuts in other areas, including Social Security and Medicare.

Because of the complexity and contentiousness of some of the spending proposals, a single bill could take 12 to 18 months to draft, get the Parliamentarian's approval, and receive final votes.

One thing congressional Republicans and the president-elect seem to agree on is the need to produce results quickly. To that end, the Senate majority leader proposes putting things most Republicans would support, e.g., border security and energy, into the first of two reconciliation bills.

The two-bill strategy would leave tax issues, including extending Trump's 2017 tax credits to a second bill—giving the conferences more time to work out their differences. Although under Republican control, the Senate has a more moderate disposition and sees value in bipartisanship. Whereas House conservatives believe cooperating with the Democrats is high treason and sufficient grounds to depose a House speaker.

As tricky as the budget reconciliation strategy will prove for Capitol Hill Republicans and the Trump White House, a March 14th deadline to fund the government’s current operations is going to be an early test of Johnson’s leadership abilities and an opportunity for House conservatives—in particular—to show how serious they are about forcing trillion-dollar cuts in government spending.

Trump had hoped that the December budget resolution would have included raising the debt ceiling, as it would have allowed him to blame President Biden. The issue now has to be resolved on the Republican's watch. The ceiling is expected to be bumped up against around June of this year.

Without raising the debt ceiling or reducing spending, new programs—including extending Trump’s 2017 tax credits—won’t be able to be funded. Including the raise in any reconciliation bill will greatly complicate matters as there is a fair amount of opposition within the GOP ranks.

The president-elect clearly anticipates trouble on these matters from at least one Texas representative—Chip Roy (R-TX). Trump has recently expressed what he thinks of the leading House far-right conservative:

[Representative] Chip Roy is just another ambitious guy, with no talent...I hope some talented challengers are getting ready in the Great State of Texas to go after Chip in the Primary. He won’t have a chance!

The razor-thin House majority gives Roy and any two of the 30 or so members of the House Freedom Caucus a significant opportunity to cause chaos in the Republican ranks.

Caving to Roy and others means Johnson will likely lose the votes of the more moderate members of his conference. Yet, failing to get their votes means the speaker (and President Trump) will need Democratic votes to pass critical legislation like budget resolutions and raising the debt ceiling. Getting Democratic votes won’t come without making concessions, e.g., maintaining renewable energy programs at the Department of Energy.

Senate hearings on the president-elect’s cabinet nominees are beginning in earnest this second week of January. Hearings for the following key energy and environment decision makers will be occurring the week of January 12th: Pam Bondiv (Justice); Sean Duffy (Transportation); Chris Wright (Energy); Russell Vought (Office of Management and Budget); Lee Zeldin (EPA); and Scott Bessent (Treasury).

Two other nominees of note confronting Senate questioners this week are Doug Burgum (Interior) and Pete Hegseth (Defense). Hegseth is one of Trump's most controversial cabinet nominees. Hegseth, a former FOX News presenter, faces serious questions about his character and experience.

It's rumored that there’s been a lessening of opposition to Hegseth's nomination. Trump continues to support him, and the nominee has softened some of his positions, e.g., opposition to women serving in combat positions.

Hegseth should be considered a bellwether of how disposed Republican senators are to giving Trump most of his nominees. It's fair to say many of the candidates aren’t at all qualified for the positions they've been nominated to hold. Loyalty—to Trump—is the key qualification. As to managerial capabilities, White House Chief of Staff Susie Weils said, "That's what staff are for." ." However, not all of his nominees are likely to make it—if not for substantive reasons, to show the world Republican senators aren’t all Trump’s pawns.

Even if Hegseth and a few of the other more controversial picks don’t make it, I expect GOP senators to go along with most of the others as a way to pre-appease Mr. Trump on legislative matters.

The tensions within and between congressional Republicans aren’t going away. In fact, they may just be heating up. With the Republicans controlling Congress and the White House, far-right conservatives are saying: “If not now, when?”

They feel they’ve been betrayed by Speakers Bohner (R-OH), Ryan (R-WI), McCarthy (R-CA), and now Johnson. Although they’ve fallen in line for the moment, I expect their patience will be exhausted before too long. There are a handful of far-right House conservatives like Roy and Thomas Massie (R-WV) who are either secure enough in their districts to withstand being primaried or who don’t care if they keep their seats if it means not trimming trillions from federal budgets and deficits.

Doug Burgum should have little trouble getting through the confirmation gauntlet. In addition to his nomination as Secretary of the Interior, he’ll chair the National Energy Council. The Council is newly established by the president-elect. It will include representatives from all executive branch agencies involved in energy permitting, production, generation, distribution, regulation, and transportation.

Trump has now indicated he will issue 100 executive orders on Day 1. Many of those orders will be rescinding most—if not all—of President Biden's climate-related orders. It should also be expected that dozens of joint resolutions disapproving of regulations finalized during the last 60 legislative days of the previous (118th) will be introduced and signed by Trump in the coming weeks. The disapproval authority is granted to the Congress under the Congressional Review Act.

Any doubts that energy and environmental issues were on Trump’s mind were erased last week during an impromptu press conference he held at Mar-a-Lago. Pretty much unbidden, he launched off against the “Green New Scam” and vowed to halt all offshore wind—he had previously urged the UK to scrap its North Sea windmills to expand North Sea drilling. He further blamed windmills for the death of whales, vowed to rescind an EV mandate that doesn’t exist, and declared war on any jurisdiction attempting to outlaw natural gas hookups in new construction. Efficiency measures like low-flow showerheads and clothes washers were also attacked.

President Biden's offshore drilling ban on 625 million acres appeared to trigger Trump's anti-renewables rant. He promised to reverse the ban immediately. However, it won't be possible as congressional action is required. (I should note that the oil sector didn’t seem particularly put out by the ban as it covers areas they hadn't planned to drill on—at least for the foreseeable future.)

And finally, under the category of it-takes-one-to-know-one, Steve Bannon has called Elon Musk ‘“racist” and a ‘truly evil guy’, pledging to ‘take this guy down’ and kick him out of the Maga movement.”

Welcome 2025!

This article is also published on the author's blog. illuminem Voices is a democratic space presenting the thoughts and opinions of leading Sustainability & Energy writers, their opinions do not necessarily represent those of illuminem.