Three reasons Mike Johnson’s budget gambit is ridiculous and doomed

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) conjured a brilliant idea amid the backlash he faces for selling out Republicans’ budget leverage to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.). Rather than funding the government at record levels with nothing in return for the rest of the fiscal year, he will agree to fund it just for the short term so he can sell out again in two months.

How innovative!

Republicans might try to play games with the timing and process of their capitulation, but it’s all the same now that the Democrats know they’re terrified of risking a shutdown.

Johnson has made it clear to Democrats that he is even more zealously opposed than former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) to even hinting at one second of a partial government shutdown. Johnson is keen to give the Democrats whatever they want. We could have 12,000 or even 50,000 invaders arrive at the southern border every day. In Johnson’s estimation, the most important thing is not to stop the invasion but to ensure the malevolent forces behind the invasion experience no discomfort from a shutdown of their operations.

Johnson returned from the Christmas holiday with a deal he’d made with Schumer to lock in the debt ceiling plus a side agreement that countermanded the few cuts that were part of the bill Congress passed in May. Although the agreement was silent on policy disagreements, Johnson made it clear that if the Democrats’ objection to our border policies would trigger a government shutdown, he would always be the first to cave.

At that point, we lost our leverage forever.

Freedom Caucus Chairman Bob Good (R-Penn.) gave Johnson a lesson in basic politics during a closed-door meeting last week. “Well, if you fear the consequence of a failure to reach agreement more than your opponent fears the consequence of a failure to reach agreement,” Good said, “you’re going to lose every time.”

That encapsulates the crux of the GOP’s choreographed failure theater. Republicans might try to play games with the timing and process of their capitulation, but it’s all the same now that the Democrats know Republicans are terrified to come even within a few days of a shutdown.

After being rebuffed by the Freedom Caucus in the original proposal of a full year of funding, Johnson proposed a new bill to extend the twin deadlines from January 19 and February 2 to March 1 and March 8, respectively.

Here are three reasons why Johnson’s approach is ridiculous:

• There is no reason to think Johnson would be more prepared and willing to fight on a single policy issue or the spending levels in March than he is today. Either you are willing to fight, or you fear the prospect of not reaching an agreement before a government shutdown. There is no middle ground.
• Once you kick the can down the road, at least extend the deadline past April 30, which, under the debt ceiling law, would trigger the automatic 1% cuts throughout the agencies. This would at least give the GOP leverage to force Democrats to negotiate on some policy matters.
• Johnson is perpetuating his backward strategy of the “laddered” approach to government funding. The entire purpose of not placing the entire federal government on one funding bill is to minimize the collateral damage of a government shutdown from not reaching an agreement on the most contentious issues about the most controversial government agencies and policies.

As I noted in November, when Johnson first forged this dumb deal, the best way to use a laddered approach would have been to allow funding for the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, and Health and Human Services — the most controversial departments — to expire first. This would have ensured that if, for example, we had a shutdown over the border invasion, the DHS would shutter, but the Department of Veterans Affairs would remain open.

Johnson’s bill stupidly had the VA among the first agencies to face expiration on January 19, along with the Department of Transportation, which would have then triggered panicked headlines about the strain on airports and air traffic controllers.

Under Johnson’s insipid plan, in fact, the worst agencies wouldn’t shut down for another two weeks.

With Johnson extending the deadlines, he should have corrected this inversion by arranging that funding for the Justice Department, Homeland Security, and Health and Human Services expires first. That, at least, would give Republicans the extra leverage of having the more popular agencies remaining funded while Congress fights over the border, COVID policies, abortion, and the weaponization of federal law enforcement.

But no.

Unless and until we change the leadership of the Republican Party, we will continue this failure theater until we can no longer enjoy the show.