The delay marks a contrast with the once-confident posture of Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who previously said the government’s “much-needed spring cleaning” bill could get a vote this week. | Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images Trump in talks to cancel some budget cutbacks Some Republicans on and off the Hill acknowledge the package may require tweaks to certain popular programs targeted by the president.

The Trump administration is eyeing tweaks to its massive spending cuts proposal as it looks to court votes from skeptical Republicans on Capitol Hill, according to multiple GOP aides close to the legislation.

The White House is already in talks about canceling cutbacks for a wastewater treatment program at the EPA, according to two Republicans familiar with the discussions. The administration might also scale back cuts for Ebola funding and disaster relief, the aides said.


The Trump administration’s $15.3 billion plan to reel back unspent federal cash still lacks the votes in the GOP-dominated House, pushing back any action until after the weeklong Memorial Day recess.

“We never anticipated the kind of pushback we would have in our own conference on this rescissions package,” Rep. Mark Walker (R-N.C.), a key proponent of the package, told POLITICO on Tuesday.

“We’re having to go back and now get the messaging correct,” the Republican Study Committee chief said, adding that the House actually seems “further" away from the needed 218 votes than it was last week.

The delay marks a contrast with the once-confident posture of Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who previously said the government’s “much-needed spring cleaning” bill could get a vote this week. It even received a rare single-digit bill number, reserved for the House GOP’s biggest priorities.

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Top Republicans are confident the package will ultimately pass, particularly after a group of government lawyers gave a seal of approval Tuesday. That likely means the bill will be filibuster-proof in the Senate and would need just a simple majority to pass.

McCarthy’s office said in a statement Wednesday that support for President Donald Trump’s cutback request is “growing by the day” and the House is expected to take up the bill sometime after the Memorial Day recess.

“Leader McCarthy continues to actively support the whip operation to send these spending cuts to the Senate,” McCarthy spokesman Matt Sparks said by email.

With eyes on a June 22 deadline for action, House GOP leaders are stepping up their vote-counting operation with aims of bringing the bill to the floor the first week of June, according to lawmakers and aides.

“We’re working it, one member at a time,” said Rep. Tom Cole, (R-Okla.), a House deputy whip.

Walker, who has met with White House budget director Mick Mulvaney on the issue, said he believes the House holdup is “just a quick flare-up” that can be resolved through extensive member outreach in the next few weeks.

Still, some Republicans on and off the Hill acknowledge the package may require tweaks to certain popular programs targeted by Trump.

One likely change would let the EPA keep a $10 million wastewater program, according to Republicans familiar with the ongoing talks.

The fix is mostly technical, because the EPA has informed the White House that, in fact, it has a plan for spending that money. But taking it out of the package would also appease Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), a key holdout on the bill.

Other potential changes could be related to proposed cutbacks to years-old funds to fight the Ebola virus and to help communities recover from Hurricane Sandy, which have ran into political resistance in the House.

The White House is unlikely to back down on its $7 billion cutback from the Children’s Health Insurance Program, however, which could prove problematic for House Republican leaders.

The political threat of cutting CHIP is one of the biggest hurdles for GOP leaders as they sell the bill. But it's far from the only problem.

One House GOP aide close to the process said the bill’s prospects appeared in doubt this week after days of tense Republican infighting, which has distracted members from the once-revered package of spending cuts.

“The majority leader’s office this week has a change in tone from their previously bullish rhetoric,” the House aide said.

Nearly a dozen House Republicans are now on the record voicing concerns with the bill, and many more remain noncommittal.

The list of GOP skeptics in the House includes Northeastern moderates like Chris Smith (R-N.J.), Leonard Lance (R-N.J.) and Pete King (R-N.Y.), as well as potentially vulnerable lawmakers like Rep. Kevin Yoder (R-Kan.) — all of whom confirmed their concerns to POLITICO on Tuesday.

Several lawmakers, Reps. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho), Mario Diaz-Balart (R-Fla.) and John Carter (R-Texas), have already raised objections stemming from their roles on the Appropriations panel. Others, including Reps. Vern Buchanan (R-Fla.) and Tom MacArthur (R-N.J.), have complained publicly about the CHIP funding cutback.

Rep. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.), a longtime Trump ally, said he personally backs the package but acknowledges that it presents a messaging issue ahead of the midterms.

“The problem is, the Democrats are misrepresenting CHIP,” the New York Republican said Tuesday. “The Democrats will exploit this with a sound bite that is not accurate, but could be upsetting to folks, if their sound bite is, ‘The Republicans are voting to cut CHIP.’”

Even lawmakers who publicly support the proposal are privately worried that it could have unintended consequences on programs like CHIP — or that it could be used against them on the campaign trail.

The potential fight over CHIP continues to spook Republicans even after the White House was handed key validation from neutral experts at the Congressional Budget Office and the Government Accountability Office.

The CBO released a report this month confirming that the proposed $7 billion “cut” to CHIP would have zero effect on the program, defusing a key talking point from Democrats.

Supporters of the package point out that Republican lawmakers who are most familiar with the children’s health program, like Energy and Commerce Chairman Greg Walden (R-Ore.), support the proposal.

“Certainly on the issues within our jurisdiction I’m supportive. In part because we got a 10-year fully funded CHIP program in place,” Walden told POLITICO on Tuesday.

Rep. Tom Rooney (R-Fla.), who sits on the Appropriations Committee, said he initially had an issue with the timing of the package, and how it was originally billed as a “do-over” of the omnibus.

“For a lot of people politically that was a really tough vote,” he said. “To go back and revisit that with some people that got a lot of shit from their base is like ripping the Band-Aid off again.”

But Rooney said that overall, he does support an attempt to roll back “dollars that are unspent and won’t be spent,” which he said makes it “a little easier to vote for.”

If the bill does pass the House, it would face an even closer vote in the Senate, where both Murkowski and her moderate colleague, Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), have voiced concerns. GOP leaders can't afford to lose a single Republican vote on the proposal, even with the special procedural powers.

Even if the White House does concede on the EPA program, Murkowski told reporters she has concerns with “many of the different accounts” being targeted in the White House package.

Murkowski has argued that some of the grant programs on the chopping block do hold merit, but are just slow in releasing the cash.

“There are many different accounts where I think we may be in a situation where the reason there are balances on the books right now is because the federal government or agencies haven’t done the job we expect them to do in releasing the funds in a timely manner,” Murkowski told reporters.

