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Republicans have clinched control of the House of Representatives, giving them total control of Washington and a clear path to delivering on President-elect Donald Trump’s plans for continued tax cuts and a more stringent border policy.
The party is already preparing to use its majorities in the House and Senate to enact as much of Trump’s tax agenda as they can along party lines, without risking a Democratic filibuster. That can be accomplished thanks to the legislative tool known as budget reconciliation.
“Unified control provides a historic opportunity to use the budget reconciliation process to accomplish our goals with simple majorities in both chambers,” House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., wrote to colleagues as he sought reelection to his post this week.
Reconciliation is the same tool that President Joe Biden and Democrats used in 2021 and 2022 to pass hundreds of billions of dollars of clean energy benefits and other new policies. Even before Republicans’ victories in this month’s election, their congressional leaders were talking about how best to leverage that power to help Trump.
In order to get a party-line bill past Democratic objections in the Senate, however, the GOP needed to secure control of the House. That took a full week past the election, as ballots were tallied in tight swing races.
“If you’re going to legitimately work around the filibuster, it would be through reconciliation,” outgoing Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell told reporters last week. “We’d be, obviously, more successful if we get the House.”
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One factor that will make Republicans’ path forward more complicated: Trump already has tapped two of their members to join his administration, Reps. Elise Stefanik of New York and Mike Waltz of Florida. Both hold safely red seats that would likely be won by their party in a special election, but their short-term absences promise to shrink the GOP’s majority further.
The party’s control came down to a number of tightly contested races in the West, and the path narrowed for Democrats over the weekend when Rep. Yadira Caraveo conceded to GOP Rep.-elect Gabe Evans in Colorado.
Republicans were widely expected to lose the House after a chaotic two years in power that featured highly public intraparty squabbles and the ousting of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy. House GOP lawmakers splintered between pro- and anti-McCarthy factions that created lingering rivalries — some of which spilled over into the campaign. Members feared the infighting left them with little to run on in terms of accomplishments.
But in the end, Trump’s romp helped power House Republicans to victory.
“The mandate that has been delivered shows that a majority of Americans are eager for secure borders, lower costs, peace through strength, and a return to common sense,” Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., wrote in his missive requesting to lead the conference in the new Congress.
By the middle of last week, Democrats began to have serious doubts about reclaiming the House. Many were privately concerned about their margins in bellwether districts, including several in blue New York and Virginia. Trump’s gains in reliably Democratic states ultimately made it difficult for the party’s House candidates to surf the GOP wave.