House Speaker Mike Johnson said on March 2 that he plans to pursue a clean bill to extend government funding through September before working towards including cuts recommended by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in fiscal year 2026 legislation.
Currently, government funding expires on March 14.
Johnson’s backing of a clean bill to extend funding, a plan green-lighted by President Donald Trump, comes after some Republicans sought to immediately implement Musk’s DOGE recommendations in a funding bill.
However, that likely would have been opposed by Democrats, whose support will be necessary for any funding extension in the stopgap-averse House GOP. House Republicans have an effective one-vote majority.
“We’re looking to pass a clean [continuing resolution] to freeze funding at current levels to make sure that the government can stay open while we begin to incorporate all these savings that we’re finding through the DOGE effort and these other sources of revenue,” Johnson during an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday.
“And then for FY26, for the next fiscal year, you’re going to see a very different process and a lot more efficient and effective spending for the people.”
Trump said he approved of passing a clean government funding extension in a Feb. 27 post on Truth Social.
“We are working very hard with the House and Senate to pass a clean, temporary government funding Bill (‘CR’) to the end of September. Let’s get it done!” he wrote.
A continuing resolution (CR) would fund the government without increasing or decreasing appropriations for agencies and other government initiatives.
Johnson had previously told reporters that a CR was the “most reasonable thing to do to ensure that the government is not shut down.”
House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) is currently leading negotiations for the Democrats, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) told reporters on Feb. 27.
He did not say if Democrats would support a CR.
“In terms of any subsequent consideration of a year-long continuing resolution, that’s a conversation that we'll have at the appropriate moment with the entirety of the House Democratic caucus,” Jeffries said.
It only takes a simple majority to pass a CR in the House, but it’s not clear whether the resolution would pass the Senate’s 60-vote filibuster threshold.
The GOP is also looking to implement Trump’s agenda through a process called reconciliation. That allows for legislation related to spending, taxing, and the national debt to bypass the filibuster requirements.
However, to activate the reconciliation process, both the House and Senate must pass an identical budget resolution. So far, each chamber has worked on and passed its own resolutions. The Senate is now considering the House version for passage.
—Jacob Burg, Joseph Lord
WALTZ
National security adviser Mike Waltz said on March 1 that administration officials advised Trump to avoid a scheduled follow-up meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy after the latter clashed with the president in a heated White House exchange the previous day.
Speaking with Fox News’ Charlie Hurt, Waltz explained how he and Secretary of State Marco Rubio had to speak with Zelenskyy after the Ukrainian president was escorted out of the Oval Office.
During the meeting, both Trump and Vice President JD Vance told Zelenskyy he needed to be willing to compromise and suggested he needed to be more grateful and respectful to the United States for what it had already provided and for the Trump administration’s effort to help broker a cease-fire deal to end the war Russia began with its invasion of Ukraine three years ago.
We “pretty much unanimously advised the President that after that insult in the Oval Office, we just do not see how that could move forward, that any few further engagement would only go backwards from this moment on,” Waltz told Hurt regarding Trump’s previous plans to meet with Zelenskyy for lunch after the Oval Office exchange.
Waltz and Rubio had to speak with the Ukrainian president’s entourage after he was asked to leave the White House. Ukrainian Ambassador to the United States Oksana Markarova was “practically in tears” as the delegation waited, Waltz said, while Zelenskyy remained seemingly argumentative.
Waltz recalled telling Zelenskyy, “Look, Mr. President, time is not on your side here. Time is not on your side on the battlefield. Time is not on your side in terms of the world situation, and most importantly, U.S. aid and the taxpayers’ tolerance is not unlimited.”
The national security adviser denied allegations that the White House talks were intended as some kind of ambush and said the administration was preparing to sign a deal with Zelenskyy on rare earth minerals in exchange for continued military support.
—Jacob Burg, Joseph Lord
BOOKMARKS
A measles outbreak in western Texas that has infected over 100 people and caused one death is a “top priority” for Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., The Epoch Times’ Jack Phillips reported. His agency will send 2,000 doses of the MMR vaccine to Texas through its immunization program.
Despite coal’s villainization among climate circles in recent years, those within the industry see fresh hope with Trump’s administration. The Epoch Times’ Allan Stein traveled to towns where coal remains a crucial industry to speak with locals and analysts, who see a future for coal under the new Trump administration despite mine and energy plant closures and federal regulations.
Gamers total 71 percent of the U.S. population and, on average, spend at least one month per year gaming. An infographic by The Epoch Times’ Marina Zhang explores how this habit affects the brain.
The son of a jailed Chinese journalist is calling on the Chinese regime to release his father, The Epoch Times’ Alex Wu reported. Observers have said that the case shows that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is further tightening control amid intensified political infighting.
