Senate Republicans on Wednesday began consideration of their budget blueprint that sets instructions for forthcoming legislation featuring up to $345 billion in funding for border security, immigration enforcement and defense needs. 

GOP members of the Senate Budget Committee defended their decision to advance those priorities ahead of sweeping tax and spending cuts, as House Republicans released a competing budget blueprint that calls for combining everything into one massive bill. 

“The reason I want to start and I want to start now is because there’s a sense of urgency about the immigration plan of President Trump,” Budget Chairman Lindsey Graham, South Carolina Republican, said, noting the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency is running out of money.

“To my colleagues in the House, I hope you can pass one, big beautiful bill,” he said. “But we’ve got to move on this issue.”

Sen. John Kennedy, Louisiana Republican, said the Senate budget resolution is not intended to undermine his home-state colleague, House Speaker Mike Johnson, whom he has “complete confidence in,” but to keep the process moving. 

“I don’t care if we do one bill or two bills,” he said. “I can teach this round or flat. I just want to see us pass something.” 

The Senate Budget Committee kicked off what is expected to be a two-day markup of its budget resolution Wednesday with two hours of opening statements before recessing for a lunch break, after which the panel plans to return and consider amendments. 

The most important part of the budget resolution is the reconciliation instructions it contains for the coming border, defense and energy bill Senate Republicans want to speed through Congress. 

The budget instructs the judiciary and Homeland Security committees in both chambers to provide $175 billion for border security and immigration enforcement measures and the armed services committees to come up with $150 billion for defense. The transportation committees would also be able to contribute up to $20 billion for the Coast Guard to assist with border security and defense. 

Democrats questioned Republicans’ decision to use the partisan reconciliation process, which will allow them to skirt a potential filibuster in the Senate, to pass funding that could get bipartisan support. 

“You don’t need to use reconciliation to fund spending on defense. We do it all the time in a bipartisan way,” Sen. Tim Kaine, Virginia Democrat, said, noting Congress has also cut bipartisan deals providing for border funding but Republicans have blocked them to seek stricter enforcement policies.

What the GOP budget effort is really about, Mr. Kaine argued, is dramatically cutting spending on programs that affect “everyday Americans.”

The total of up to $345 billion in new border and defense spending would be spread over four years, with other committees instructed to provide offsets over that same period.

While Mr. Graham said his intention is for all of the new spending to be offset, his budget instructions set a much more flexible floor of $5 billion in deficit reduction across a handful of committees of jurisdiction.

One committee charged with contributing to the offsets is the Senate Finance Committee, which is the panel with jurisdiction over taxes and health care programs. Because the House Ways and Means Committee, the lower chamber’s tax writing committee, was not included in the instructions, that takes tax increases off the table and leaves cuts to health care programs like Medicaid, Democrats said.  

“There’s going to be an effort to keep the Medicaid cuts hidden behind the curtain, but they’re going to come sooner or later,” said Senate Finance ranking member Ron Wyden, the Oregon Democrat who also serves on the Budget panel.

Democrats also railed against expected offsets that seek to roll back President Biden’s student loan forgiveness programs and climate initiatives. 

“This budget resolution sets up a bill that opens the door to making student loans more expensive,” Senate Budget ranking member Jeff Merkley, Oregon Democrat, said. 

It also tees up Republicans’ plans to eliminate the Environmental Protection Agency’s methane fee and “sets up a strategy for encouraging massive amounts of drilling for fossil fuels, which pours fuel on the fire for climate chaos,” he said.

• Lindsey McPherson can be reached at lmcpherson@washingtontimes.com.