With assists from POLITICO’s Congress team HOW THE ‘ONE BIG BEAUTIFUL’ BILL APPROACH GOES HISTORICALLY It’s been 19 years since Congress cleared two reconciliation bills in one year. That history isn’t lost on House GOP leaders. Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune are debating whether to pass a single party-line package by summer that bundles tax, energy and border security policy — or split off taxes into its own package. And while Thune has pushed for the two-track strategy to get border and energy priorities done sooner, others argue that would mean no action on taxes. “There's serious risk in having multiple bills that have to pass to get your agenda through,” House Majority Leader Steve Scalise said. It would be “devastating,” the Louisiana Republican added, to save some policies for a second reconciliation bill and then “lose the whole second package.” Democrats ran that risk in 2021, and Republicans lost one of their two reconciliation bills in 2017. “Just look at history,” House Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith (R-Mo.) told us on Saturday, after Johnson told GOP lawmakers that President-elect Donald Trump favors “one big beautiful” reconciliation package. “The Democrats couldn't even do it,” Smith added. What he’s talking about: Democrats’ attempted a reconciliation twofer in 2021 and couldn’t get it done in the same year. They notched an early victory with swift passage of their $1.9 trillion pandemic assistance package, but then spent well over a year fighting over the second bill, which had to be drastically changed before it passed in August 2022. That kind of delay is what Smith is hoping to avoid. With many of the 2017 tax cuts set to expire on New Year’s Eve this year, Republican lawmakers simply don’t have time for protracted squabbling. The last time lawmakers cleared two reconciliation bills in one year was 2006, when Republicans used one budget resolution to pass a reconciliation bill that spurred Medicaid cuts and then another that extended tax cuts. Republicans also tried to take two bites at reconciliation not long ago. In 2017, they used two different budget resolutions to unlock reconciliation bills to repeal Obamacare and enact tax cuts in the same year. But the first measure famously died in the Senate. This time, Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) vowed that the Senate wouldn’t be the problem. “Whatever they can send to us, we can pass,” said Mullin, a close confidante of not only Trump and Thune, but also many of his former House GOP colleagues. “And I think it's going to be very difficult for the House to deliver two things, though. But if they can, wonderful,” the Oklahoma Republican added. “The House is a very thoughtful, dysfunctional body right now.” Republicans will have to make their official decision soon. Both chambers have to adopt a budget resolution to get rolling on reconciliation, and that measure has to say how many bills it prescribes. GOP lawmakers say they haven’t started writing the instructions yet, as the party tries to settle on a strategy. — Jennifer Scholtes and Katherine Tully-McManus GOOD EVENING! Welcome to Inside Congress, the play-by-play guide to all things Capitol Hill, on this Monday, Jan. 6, where the snowy setting was thankfully the most dramatic element of today’s presidential election certification. WHY DEMS DIDN’T OBJECT TO TRUMP’S VICTORY House Democrats certified Trump’s victory without drama Monday afternoon, the first time lawmakers certified a Republican win with no objections in more than two decades. But after Jan. 6, 2021, Democratic lawmakers were in no mood to make symbolic objections or use the process to air political grievances this time around. “We support the process that was carried forth, and a lot of Democrats probably disagreed with the outcome, but we support the law, and in supporting the law, you support the process. So this is part of the process,” said Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), who’d chaired the select panel that investigated the Capitol riot four years ago. And Democrats, continuing a campaign message that they’re the “adults in the room” compared to congressional Republicans, were happy to draw a contrast with the relatively subdued proceedings Monday with the chaos of four years ago. “This was a day that most people never paid attention to because you shouldn't have to,” Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.) told Inside Congress. “And yet, that didn't happen four years ago. And in fact, people died four years ago. And it's shameful to me that there are some who are attempting to whitewash that away like it didn't happen.” “There'll be no violence today, because we're not them,” said Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) “We respect the results of the election, even though we disagree with them.” — Nicholas Wu and Daniella Diaz JOHNSON ARGUES A BORDER BILL CAN WAIT Many Republicans are eager to get border policy moving as quickly as possible as the Republican trifecta takes control of Washington, a key piece of some Republicans’ argument that they should do two separate reconciliation bills.But Johnson is offering another angle: That Trump’s executive orders will give Congress more breathing room on a border bill. “There will be lots of executive order action on the border as well and a lot of attention paid to that,” said Johnson on Monday. “And we will be passing border legislation here one way or the other, the question is whether we use reconciliation as the strategy to do that. But stay tuned." Johnson’s message Monday sharply contrasted with Mullin, who said that a key priority is making border policy changes permanent, as soon as possible. “The idea that we were discussing as a whole was, which one can we make permanent the fastest? The stuff on the border needs to become permanent — not through executive orders,” Mullin said. “We know the president will do it on day one with the executive orders and roll back a lot of these disastrous regulations on day one … how do we make it permanent?” — Katherine Tully-McManus, Meredith Lee Hill and Daniella Diaz
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