House Republicans failed to pass a legislative branch spending bill on Thursday through a combination of absences and conservatives taking issue with the lack of a pay raise.
The bill’s flop signals a rocky road ahead for the GOP’s spending plan after House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, Louisiana Republican, set an ambitious schedule to pass all 12 spending bills before lawmakers leave Washington for a monthlong recess in August.
Typically, the legislative branch bill is one of the easiest to pass during a yearly spending cycle because it often lacks divisive policy riders and isn’t a spending juggernaut like other measures.
But there were concerns among Republicans about spending increases in the $7 billion bill, which typically funds the Capitol Police, the Congressional Budget Office and lawmakers’ salaries.
The bill failed 205-213, with 10 Republicans voting against it and three Democrats crossing the aisle to support it.
Republican Reps. Andy Biggs, Eli Crane and Debbie Lesko of Arizona; Tim Burchett of Tennessee; Matt Gaetz of Florida, Bob Good of Virginia; Ralph Norman of South Carolina; Matt Rosendale of Montana; Keith Self of Texas; and Andrew Clyde of Georgia all voted against the bill.
Rep. David Valadao, California Republican and chairman of the legislative branch spending subcommittee, told reporters that he was “not sure yet” why the bill failed.
He noted that some members had specific issues with the lack of a cost-of-living increase for lawmaker pay in the bill. Member pay has not increased in years, but an earlier version of the legislation would have rectified that issue until the provision was stripped out.
Mr. Clyde told The Washington Times that his biggest issue was that missing cost-of-living increase.
He didn’t say whether he was for a raise but argued that again blocking a member pay raise was unconstitutional and ran afoul of the 27th Amendment, which states that any raise or decrease in member pay has to take effect after the election cycle has finished. Fiscal 2025 is set to begin Oct. 1.
“When it is clearly unconstitutional, and you do your best to strip that particular section so that it will be constitutional, and that doesn’t work, then it becomes unconstitutional and I won’t vote for it,” he said.
So far, House Republicans have passed four of their spending bills, including measures that would fund the departments of Veterans Affairs, Defense, Homeland Security, State and Foreign Operations.
The remaining seven bills are more divisive and could spell doom for Mr. Scalise’s plan to pass them by the end of July.
Mr. Gaetz contended on X that with the country’s debt hurtling toward $35 trillion, Congress should focus on spending less. The legislative branch spending bill would have enacted a 4% increase in spending over last year.
“We should be cutting spending for every entity in government and should be leading by example,” Mr. Gaetz said.
• Alex Miller can be reached at amiller@washingtontimes.com.