The sweltering Fourth of July weekend is over, but for both parties in House and Senate leadership, the heat is still cranked up.
Both chambers are likely to return next Monday to the same sweat-inducing tangle of legislative problems that left them stumped as they headed out of town at the end of June.
Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., is looking for a solution so “irresistible” that his fellow Republicans will have to accept it — but the numbers are working against him.
For one thing, August is fast approaching, leaving just a couple weeks in Washington before lawmakers depart for an even longer summer break. And as Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., has said all along, mathematical realities can’t be changed in the Senate, even when it comes to the White House-backed voter ID bill dubbed the SAVE America Act.
Johnson can’t afford to have a repeat of last week, when GOP holdouts in the House ground the floor to a halt, seeking to pressure senators into passing the measure. They voted down a procedural rule to advance a massive fiscal 2027 defense authorization package and the National Security-State spending bill, despite attempts from Johnson to placate them.
