With US House stymied, Senate Republicans prepare to move on Trump agenda

By David Morgan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Republican-led U.S. Senate, in a bid to overcome party infighting over President Donald Trump's agenda, will begin moving forward as early as next week on a $300 billion, four-year plan to fund his border security and military priorities. 

Republicans are struggling to unify around a path to pass Trump's agenda, including extending a tax cut package for another 10 years, without adding substantially to the federal government's $36 trillion debt.

The road ahead is particularly tricky in the House of Representatives, where the party holds a razor-thin 218-215 majority that includes a significant number of hardliners who typically refuse to vote for any spending bill.

Senate Budget Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham told reporters on Wednesday he expects to begin marking up a budget resolution that will also direct committees to find offsets for the new spending with hopes of Senate action in coming weeks. Republicans would pursue an extension for Trump's tax cuts and other proposals under a separate plan later in the year.  

Republicans in the Senate and some in the House have called for Senate action on a two-bill strategy to overcome deep divisions on spending cuts that have clouded House efforts to enact Trump's agenda in a single, all-encompassing bill.

"I hope to start as early as next week," Graham said after presenting his plan to Senate Republicans over lunch. "The process will take a while. Hopefully, you know, not months but weeks."

Extending Trump's 2017 tax cuts, which are due to expire at the end of this year, is forecast to cost about $4 trillion over 10 years, according to the non-partisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. Some hardline House Republicans have been pushing for trillions of dollars in spending cuts to offset that.

According to Graham, the Senate budget resolution would spend approximately $150 billion to fund Trump's border security and immigrant deportation plan and a roughly equal amount to bolster the U.S. military to deal with global threats.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has seen his hopes of passing a budget resolution by next week fall to infighting between hardline conservatives who want deep spending cuts and moderate Republicans concerned about how such cuts might affect public services in their districts.

But the No. 2 House Republican warned the two-step Senate strategy could make it far more difficult to pass tax policies.

"Look, there are a lot of complications in the House that don't exist in the Senate ... especially when you get to a tax bill," House Majority Leader Steve Scalise told reporters. "If you had it as a standalone, it makes it a lot more complicated to pass."

In their past two years in the majority, House Republicans have repeatedly turned to Democrats to secure the votes needed to pass funding measures. In the face of Trump's aggressive moves to remake the government since taking office, top Democrats have warned they do not plan to help Republicans this time around.

Johnson has rejected assertions that time is running out for the House to act. But Senate Republicans said they see little reason to expect success in the House.  

"The Senate can act. Hopefully we can lead and the House will start seeing the game plan," said Republican Senator Ron Johnson, a member of Graham's panel. "I understand the desire from one big, beautiful bill, but just wasn't going to happen."

(Reporting by David Morgan; Editing by Scott Malone and Lincoln Feast.)