Senate Republicans hit overdrive on their play to advance Trump’s agenda

(CNN) — Senate Republicans are racing to finalize plans to move a budget blueprint that would finally unlock their ability to move ahead with Trump’s agenda in one massive policy bill.

Passing a budget framework would allow them to then write a tax, immigration and defense bill that can pass with just a simple majority in the Senate.

After months of internal divisions between House and Senate GOP leaders on how to proceed, this week has proven significant in helping leaders bridge divides that roiled the two chambers earlier this year. A lot has transpired to bring them to this moment, including Speaker Mike Johnson demonstrating repeatedly he can keep his narrow House majority in line and Senate Republican Leader John Thune’s recognition that if the House can act on Trump’s vision of “one big beautiful bill,” the Senate will need to follow suit.

There remains a lot of work ahead, but Senate leaders are signaling to their conference they could move a budget blueprint as soon as next week. That would finally get the House and Senate to a place where they can begin the bigger discussions about how to fully execute a massive tax, border, defense and savings bill that could include a debt hike for the next two years.

It’s the first, critical step to a massive undertaking.

What to expect next week

If Senate Republicans can finish an updated version of their budget blueprint and leadership is confident they have the votes, they’ll go to the floor next week. That unlocks yet another budget vote-a-rama.

Remember, that is the process in which senators can vote for hours upon hours on controversial amendments – and it doesn’t stop until both sides decide they’ve had enough. These marathons typically go into the wee hours of the morning and are painful for all involved both politically – it forces senators to take tough votes – and physically – remember: the average age of a senator is about 65 years old.

What to watch for in the days ahead

Efforts to finish this version of the Senate budget blueprint has been underway since the House passed its plan in February, but have kicked into high-gear over the last several days, sources said.

“It’s in the process of being drafted,” Thune told reporters Thursday morning of the Senate budget resolution.

House and Senate leaders, as well as the chairs of relevant committees, have been in constant contact with Treasury and the White House about priorities, continuing the conversation from a key meeting earlier in the week in which Thune, Johnson Ways and Means Chairman Jason Smith, Senate Finance Chairman Mike Crapo, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Director of the National Economic Counsel Kevin Hassett made major headway in finding a path ahead. But lawmakers are still trying to sort out a few key details — one of which will require the Senate’s parliamentarian to make a call.

A key ruling that could determine just how much Republicans can do on taxes

Forgive us, this is a little complicated, but important!

We expect in upcoming days to get a determination by the Senate parliamentarian if Republicans can proceed with an assumption that renewing the current tax cuts cost nothing. Here is why that matters:

Republicans’ argument is that continuing what is “current policy” actually doesn’t add to the deficit because despite the fact that many of the provisions have an expiration date at the end of the year, it costs nothing to keep operating at this level. Democrats wholly dispute this and this isn’t how the Congressional Budget Office looks at scoring. But this logic is important to the debate because it would allow Republicans to pass a whole lot more tax cuts – including key priorities for the president like no taxes on tips – while still keeping those cuts under the cap the House budget resolution already set. That plan outlines Congress will spend no more than $4.5 trillion on taxes.

Republicans have been socializing this idea with Elizabeth MacDonough, the current parliamentarian, for weeks now. But she has yet to make an official ruling. Republicans argue that the Budget Act of 1974 dictates the Budget Chairman (in this case Sen. Lindsey Graham) can make this call unilaterally, but Democrats argue that’s imaginary math, a slippery slope that allows a chairman to undermine the strict rules that govern budget reconciliation in the first place.

Next up: Can the Senate GOP rally behind a plan that raises the debt ceiling?

A key takeaway from Tuesday’s meeting with GOP leadership was that they are going to at least try to include a debt ceiling increase in this package. It’s the president’s preference to do this with just GOP votes, but despite that, some conservatives in the Senate like Rand Paul of Kentucky have voiced some concerns at the idea. It’s worth noting, Thune has room for error here. He can lose three members and still get this through.

The obvious motivation is that negotiating a debt ceiling increase with just Republicans means that the party won’t have to negotiate and give Democrats anything to avoid a default. That is a huge motivator and ultimately was enough to convince House Republicans to vote almost entirely together to pass the budget blueprint in their chamber in February.

Passing the budget is only the first step

We expect the Senate’s bill won’t match the House’s instructions perfectly. And after the Senate passes the resolution, the House will have to act again on their own and accept some of the Senate’s changes.

That, of course, becomes yet another test for Johnson to keep his members in line in this process. And House conservatives are adamant that they won’t support any budget plan with any fewer spending cuts.

OK, but this is just the blueprint?

You may be wondering: When do they write the actual bill with tax cuts and money for the border and defense?

Johnson has repeatedly said it is his goal to get that final package to the president’s desk by Memorial Day. That’s an extremely ambitious timeline in part because this budget resolution – although challenging – pushes many of the hardest choices about the amount of spending cuts, where to cut, and which tax provisions to include – down the road. That is where members care the most and it’s where Johnson and Thune will have to work overtime to keep their conferences united even if everyone doesn’t get their provision included.

Sen. Mike Crapo, the finance chairman, told CNN earlier this month that members have submitted hundreds of requests for tax provisions to his committee. That means every senator (and you can be sure every House member too) is fighting for something specific they want in this bill. For some frontline Republicans in the House, that’s raising the cap on the state and local tax deduction, which was slashed in the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. For others, it’s expanding the research and development tax credits. Still more may want expanding the child tax credit.

Every member has a priority here and remembering that the budget blueprint is just the first step and technically the easy part, is worth keeping in perspective.

CNN’s Sarah Ferris, Manu Raju and Ted Barrett contributed to this report.

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