McCarthy gives in to right flank on spending cuts, but they still deliver a defeat as shutdown looms
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy emerged with a spending cut plan to prevent a federal government shutdown by appeasing his hard-right flank, only to see it quickly collapse Thursday in a crushing defeat
WASHINGTON — House Speaker Kevin McCarthy emerged with a spending cut plan to avert a looming federal government shutdown by appeasing his hard-right flank, only to see it quickly collapse Thursday in a crushing defeat, the next steps uncertain.
His latest attempt to move ahead with a traditionally popular defense funding bill as a first step toward keeping the government running was shattered by a core group of Republican colleagues who refused to vote with the increasingly endangered speaker.
A test vote to advance the bill failed, 212-216, as a handful of Republicans joined with Democrats to stop it. It was the third time that McCarthy, R-Calif., has been stymied, and once again the House came to a sudden standstill.
The open revolt was further evidence that McCarthy’s strategy of repeatedly giving in to the conservatives is seemingly only emboldening them. A handful of GOP lawmakers, urged on by Donald Trump, the party’s early front-runner for the 2024 presidential nomination, has run roughshod over their own House majority.
Trump urged the conservatives to hold the line against the higher funding levels McCarthy had agreed to with President Joe Biden earlier this year and to end the federal criminal indictments against him.
“This is also the last chance to defund these political prosecutions against me and other Patriots,” Trump wrote on social media. “They failed on the debt limit, but they must not fail now. Use the power of the purse and defend the Country!”
A federal shutdown looms Sept. 30, the end of the current
Read more on abcnews.go.com
