Freedom Caucus eyes reconciliation 2.0

• "The plan is to do one in the fall for FY26 budget year, and we can also squeeze in a third one for FY27 before this Congress is up," House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said last week on Fox News.

Catch up quick: Freedom Caucus holdouts delayed key procedural votes for record lengths last week, prompting the House to stay in session overnight.

• After a couple hours of talks with GOP leadership, and White House officials like OMB Director Russ Vought, they all flipped and supported the bill.

What they're saying: Holdouts said they were given "assurances" some of their priorities that got nixed in the Senate have paths forward, either in future reconciliation bills, or through executive action.

• Tackling the deficit, making deeper cuts to wind and solar tax credits, and more aggressively going after fraud in Medicaid were among the matters discussed while the bill was in limbo.
• Trump administration officials "were very forthcoming with information about going after fraud, and getting rid of a lot of the nonsense in our energy policies," Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) told reporters Thursday.

• "There might be another reconciliation" bill for deeper spending cuts that Republicans can't achieve through the regular appropriations process, Burchett added.

Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) attributed his shift in support to the president himself and told Axios he wasn't directly promised anything in exchange.

• Norman said he would like to see a broader phase-out of clean energy tax credits and an executive action targeting Medicaid fraud.

The bottom line: While conservative hardliners are claiming victory for the handshake deals they obtained, they didn't get any of the actual changes they wanted to the "big, beautiful bill."