The good news for President-elect Donald Trump’s legislative agenda is that his party has unified control of Congress. The not-as-good news is the fact that the Republican majority in the House is the smallest for any party in almost 100 years. And, as we saw in last week’s vote for Speaker, a handful of rabble-rousers can disrupt even the best-laid plans.
Then there’s the fact that the House and Senate leadership are divided on the best path forward. Many GOP senators, including Majority Leader John Thune, have indicated a preference for breaking up their priorities into two separate pieces of legislation: one tackling the issue of the border and potentially energy policy and the other on taxes and spending. This would theoretically ensure a quick and early win for Trump on one of his top campaign issues, while leaving the more complicated and tedious work of tax legislation until later.
Others, such as Speaker Mike Johnson, would like to roll all of those issues into one big bill to help ensure as few defections as possible; the bigger the
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