The News
Senate Republicans are preparing over the break to launch a quick party-line border funding bill in the new Congress, three people familiar with the plans say.
Everything is fluid, but the Senate Budget Committee may move a budget resolution in early- to mid-January; a very aspirational goal could put the budget resolution on the Senate floor before Donald Trump is sworn in. That would keep Congress on track for a Trump signature on border funding by sometime in February, pending the inevitable drama with such narrow margins in Congress (the House hasn’t fully signed off on this plan).
The budget and its unlimited vote-a-rama set the table for evading a filibuster with the subsequent reconciliation bill, which is currently around $100 billion for the border, paid for with energy leases and with a TBD national security component.
Incoming Senate Budget Committee Chair Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., told Semafor this month that he will move as fast as he can without nailing down an exact date. And if the plan works, Republicans will need to very quickly pivot to stopping expiring tax increases, a complex assignment for later in the year which will take months to complete.