Mike Johnson faces "hell week" as Republicans defy Trump
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Speaker Johnson at the Capitol on April 20. Photo: Heather Diehl/Getty Images
House Speaker Mike Johnson is staring down a brutal pre-recess session next week as he tries to cram three high-stakes votes through a fractured conference.
Why it matters: Johnson (R-La.) has built a reputation for pulling off the improbable. But his rank-and-file have shown a new willingness to buck President Trump, who the speaker relies on to close tough votes.
- The House will take up three contentious measures next week: A long-term extension of Section 702 FISA, the farm bill and the Senate-passed budget reconciliation resolution to fund ICE and Border Patrol.
- "Next week is going to be hell week," Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Texas) told reporters.
🚔 Johnson's biggest headache may be the Senate-passed budget resolution to fund parts of the Department of Homeland Security.
- 🥊 House Republicans don't buy that the Senate will do a third reconciliation bill, and they're demanding to make reconciliation 2.0 as ambitious as possible.
- "We don't trust the two step process. I just will be honest with you, because the two step process has the separation in it. That's a sticking point," Rep. Keith Self (R-Texas) told Axios.
- "We're not there yet," House Budget Chair Jodey Arrington told The Hill about getting members on board with a package that's just ICE and Border Patrol.
💰 Between the lines: DHS is running low on funds to pay its employees.
- For GOP leaders, it may not be tenable to wait a couple weeks for the reconciliation process to wrap up before passing the rest of DHS funding.
🥀 Johnson also faces a thorny path on a three-year extension of FISA that doesn't include warrant-requirements, a key demand from conservatives.
- "If you're not going to have warrants, I'm not going to play ball," Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) told Axios.
- There's also a push to attach unrelated measures: "I believe that the votes are not there unless FISA includes CBDC," Self said.
- The program is set to lapse next Thursday night without an extension, and some members say another short-term patch may be needed.
What's next: Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) told Axios that a Wednesday night meeting "resolved a lot of the issues" members had, but several conservatives expressed reservations as of Thursday morning.
