在混乱和拖延之后，众议院周二以217票对215票通过了共和党预算决议，启动了实施唐纳德·特朗普总统立法议程的进程——这对议长迈克·约翰逊来说是一个重大而关键的胜利，他正在应对共和党极其微弱的多数。
共和党领导人能够成功地推翻众议员蒂姆·伯切特、沃伦·戴维森和维多利亚·斯帕兹，他们是四个顽固分子中的三个。另一位是众议员托马斯·马西(Thomas Massie)，他是唯一投票反对该决议的共和党人。共和党人只能输掉一票。
约翰逊在投票结束后对记者说:“还有很多工作要做，但我们今晚将庆祝，我们将卷起袖子，在第二天早上重新开始。”。
尚不清楚共和党人是否有足够的票数在周二下午和晚上通过这项措施。至少有四名共和党成员表示，他们将对该计划投反对票，议长迈克·约翰逊只能承受一次背叛。
众议院共和党人周二晚上举行了一个多小时的首次投票，领导层试图为拨款决议争取选票，民主党人表示抗议。
共和党领导人随后暂时取消了预算决议——一系列投票中的下一项——并在几分钟后重新安排了时间，并将整个众议院召回会议厅。
民主党领导人能够让更多的成员参加关键的投票。正在休产假的众议员Brittany Petterson带着她的儿子前来投票。有健康问题的众议员凯文·马林带着助行器出现了。众议院民主党领导人在给民主党人的一封邮件中抱怨说，约翰逊在向他们保证今晚众议院不会进行进一步投票后，试图“强行通过”预算决议。
在投票之前，约翰逊告诉记者，“我们正在努力解决关注的问题。很多人想确保我们削减了适当的数量……这是一个非常复杂的谈判……我们会达成目标的。”
该决议现已提交参议院，在那里，领导层将如何处理该蓝图仍是一个未决问题。参议院多数党领袖约翰·图恩(John Thune)在上议院采取了不同的方法——专注于国防和边境安全支出的一项法案，以及后来处理减税和债务上限的一项法案，尽管总统完全赞同众议院共和党的蓝图。
共和党人计划使用和解，这是一种只需要简单多数就能通过的策略。但是在和解的情况下，两院必须通过完全相同的决议。
“这是开启和解进程的第一个重要步骤。投票结束后，约翰逊说:“我们还有很多艰苦的工作要做。”。“我们将实施美国第一议程。我们将交付全部，而不仅仅是部分，这是这一过程的第一步。”
共和党人向特朗普施压，向坚持己见的人和其他犹豫不决的共和党成员施压。
“总统已经和许多成员谈过了。他已经清楚地表明了他的意图，他希望他们投票赞成并推动这一计划，这样我们就可以开始这一进程，”约翰逊说。
但周二晚些时候，特朗普在椭圆形办公室签署行政命令时表示，“我没有参与那件事。他们知道我想要什么。”
伯切特告诉美国广播公司新闻，他与特朗普进行了交谈，但拒绝透露谈话的细节。
约翰逊早些时候不确定投票是否会在周二举行，暗示投票可能会推迟。
“今晚可能会有投票。可能没有。敬请关注。这就是你得到报酬的原因。在这附近逛逛，”他对记者说。
众议院多数党领袖史蒂夫·斯卡利斯(Steve Scalise)为预算辩护，称民主党人断言共和党人准备大幅削减医疗补助时是在“撒谎”。
“这项法案甚至一次都没有提到‘医疗补助’这个词，然而，所有民主党人都在预算中撒谎，因为他们不想谈论真相，”斯卡利斯说。“与其坐在后面舔着他们与美国人民完全脱节的伤口，他们唯一的选择是对今天的投票内容撒谎。这个法案中没有医疗补助。该法案没有削减医疗补助。然而，这就是他们所说的一切。”
虽然蓝图本身没有直接提到医疗补助，但它设定了至少削减2万亿美元强制性联邦支出的目标，其中包括为社会保障和医疗保险等福利项目提供资金。
约翰逊和他的领导团队工作了数周来平息人们的担忧。
在周二的闭门会议后，马西打趣道，共和党领导人已经“说服他”投反对票-预测这项措施实际上将增加数十亿美元的赤字。
尽管如此，约翰逊为蓝图辩护。
“我们的目标和承诺一直是赤字中立。这就是我们的目标。如果我们能减少赤字，那就更好了，”约翰逊在回应有关该计划将增加赤字的指责时说。
其他一些共和党人尚未决定，包括纽约州众议员尼科尔·马利托基斯(Nicole Malliotakis)，强调她是代表她的老年选民行事。
“我还没有决定，但我更倾向于同意，因为我已经得到了一些明确和保证，让我觉得可以让这个过程向前推进，”她说。“我们必须确保在这一过程中，领导层包括我们这些拥有大量医疗补助人口的人。”
自称“预算鹰派”的佐治亚州众议员里奇·麦考密克早些时候说，他仍在“讨论”是否支持该决议。
“我希望我们在削减开支方面更加积极，这样我们就可以在社会保障、医疗保险、医疗补助等方面节省开支，”他说。
“我正试图弄清楚这到底意味着什么……这项法案将如何影响实际的硬数字，这就是我感兴趣的，”他说。
周二下午，众议院民主党人聚集在国会大厦台阶上，抗议对民主的“攻击”和“不计后果的共和党预算”。
众议院少数党领袖哈基姆·杰弗里斯(Hakeem Jeffries)领导了这组立法者，他宣布民主党人已经团结一致反对这项措施。
“所以让我说清楚，众议院民主党人不会对这个鲁莽的共和党预算投一票，一票也不会，一票也不会。他们不会得到一张民主党的选票。为什么?因为我们是在和美国人民一起投票，”他说。
杰弗里斯说，共和党的预算计划“代表着美国历史上最大的医疗补助削减”，并补充说，“儿童将受到打击。家庭会被摧毁。残疾人会崩溃的。学长们会崩溃的。医院会被摧毁;养老院会一蹶不振。”
“我们关心的一切都受到了攻击。经济受到冲击。安全网正受到攻击。我们作为一个国家的生活方式正在受到攻击。民主本身正受到攻击。唐纳德·特朗普、政府和众议院共和党人正在伤害美国人民，”他说。
House Republicans narrowly pass measure to fund Trump's agenda after last-minute drama
Following chaos and delay, the House on Tuesday passed the Republican budget resolution to start the process to enact President Donald Trump’s legislative agenda by a vote of 217-215 -- a big and critical win for Speaker Mike Johnson, who was dealing with an extremely narrow GOP majority.
GOP leaders were able to successfully flip Reps. Tim Burchett, Warren Davidson and Victoria Spartz, three of four holdouts. The other, Rep. Thomas Massie, was the only Republican who voted against the resolution. Republicans could afford to lose only one vote.
"A lot of work yet to be done, but we're going to celebrate tonight, and we'll roll up our sleeves and get right back at it in the morning," Johnson said to reporters after the vote.
It was not clear whether Republicans would have the votes to pass the measure on Tuesday afternoon and into the evening. At least four Republicans members had said they would vote no on the plan and Speaker Mike Johnson could afford only one defection.
House Republicans held open their first vote Tuesday night for more than an hour as leadership tried to wrangle votes for the funding resolution and Democrats protested.
GOP leaders then briefly pulled the budget resolution -- the next vote in a series -- from the schedule and rescheduled it a few minutes later and called the entire House back to the chamber.
Democratic leaders were able to get more of their members to attend the critical vote. Rep. Brittany Petterson, who is on maternity leave, showed up to vote with her son. Rep. Kevin Mullin, who has a medical condition, showed up with a walker. House Democratic leaders complained in a message to Democrats that Johnson was trying to “jam” the budget resolution through after assuring them there would be no further votes in the House for the night.
Before the vote, Johnson told reporters, "We are trying to work through concerns and issues. A lot of people want to make sure we are cutting an appropriate amount … it's a very complicated negotiation … we will get there."
The resolution now heads to the Senate, where it is an open question as to what leadership will do with the blueprint. Senate Majority Leader John Thune has a different approach in the upper chamber -- focusing one bill on defense and border security spending and a later one that would deal with tax cuts and the debt ceiling, although the president has wholly endorsed the House Republican blueprint.
Republicans plan to use reconciliation, a tactic that requires only a simple majority to pass. But under reconciliation, both chambers must adopt the exact same resolution.
"This is the first important step in opening up the reconciliation process. We have a lot of hard work ahead of us," Johnson said after the vote. "We are going to deliver the America First agenda. We're going to deliver all of it, not just parts of it, and this is the first step of that process."
Republicans leaned on Trump to pressure the holdouts and other GOP members who were undecided.
"The president has talked to a number of members. He's made his intentions well known and he wants them to vote for this and move it along so we can start the process," Johnson said.
But later Tuesday, while signing executive orders in the Oval Office, Trump said, "I'm not involved in that. They know what I want."
Burchett told ABC News that he spoke to Trump, but declined to divulge details on the conversation.
Johnson earlier was uncertain if the vote would happen Tuesday, suggesting it could get pushed.
"There may be a vote tonight. There may not be. Stay tuned. That's why you get paid. Hang around here," he said to reporters.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise defended the budget -- contending that Democrats were "lying" when they asserted that Republicans are primed to make deep cuts to Medicaid.
"This bill doesn't even mention the word 'Medicaid' a single time, and yet, all Democrats are doing is lying about what's in the budget because they don't want to talk about the truth," Scalise said. "Instead of just sitting back and licking their wounds that they're completely out of touch with the American people, their only choice is to resort to lying about what's in this vote today. There is no Medicaid in this bill. There are no Medicaid cuts in this bill. Yet that's all they're saying."
While the blueprint itself does not mention Medicaid directly, it sets a goal of at least $2 trillion in cuts to mandatory federal spending, which includes funding for entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare.
Johnson and his leadership team worked for weeks to mollify concerns.
Following a closed-door conference meeting Tuesday, Massie quipped that GOP leaders have "convinced him" to vote no -- predicting the measure would actually increase the deficit by billions of dollars.
Nevertheless, Johnson defended the blueprint.
"The objective and our commitment has always been deficit neutrality. That's the goal here. If we can reduce the deficit, even better," Johnson said responding to accusations that the plan would increase the deficit.
Some additional Republicans were undecided, including New York Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, stressing she was acting on behalf of her aging constituency.
"I'm still undecided, but I'm leaning more towards yes because I've gotten some clarity and assurances that make me feel comfortable allowing this process to move forward," she said. "We have to make sure that leadership includes those of us who have large Medicaid populations in that process."
Self-proclaimed "budget hawk" Georgia Rep. Rich McCormick said earlier he was still "in discussions" on whether or not to back the resolution.
"I'd like us to be more aggressive on spending cuts so we can save on things like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid," he said.
"I am trying to figure out exactly what this entails… how this bill is going to affect the actual hard numbers, and that's what I'm interested in," he said.
House Democrats gathered on the Capitol steps Tuesday afternoon to protest an "assault" on democracy and the "reckless Republican budget."
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries led the group of lawmakers, declaring that Democrats have unified their opposition against the measure.
"So let me be clear, House Democrats will not provide a single vote to this reckless Republican budget, not one, not one, not one. They will not get a single Democratic vote. Why? Because we're voting with the American people," he said.
Jeffries said the GOP budget plan "represents the largest Medicaid cut in American history," adding that "children will be devastated. Families will be devastated. People with disabilities will be devastated. Seniors will be devastated. Hospitals will be devastated; nursing homes will be devastated."
"Everything we care about is under assault. The economy is under assault. The safety net is under assault. Our very way of life as a country is under assault. Democracy itself is under assault. Donald Trump, the administration and House Republicans are hurting the American people," he said.
