Will Speaker Johnson Eat His Words on a December Omnibus?

“We don’t want any buses,” House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters in a Tuesday press conference. “We’re not going to do any buses, OK?”

Johnson’s comments came a day before Congress punted on fiscal year 2025 appropriations until December. But might there be a scenario come December in which an omnibus or minibus is the best path forward for Republicans?

On Wednesday, the House and Senate approved a government funding stopgap measure called a continuing resolution, averting a government shutdown on the eve of the November 5 election. 

The Senate, led by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, seemed content from the start to circumvent the statutorily mandated appropriations process. Unsurprisingly, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, the lame-duck leader of the Senate GOP, once again found common cause with his Democratic counterpart to spend more of the American people’s money and concentrate power in congressional leadership.

Johnson, meanwhile, attempted to get one major concession for conservatives while funding the government through March. The speaker initially tried to pass a six-month continuing resolution with the SAVE Act attached, which would have protected American elections from illegal immigrant votes. Voting on that plan was delayed and failed because 14 Republicans joined Democrats in voting no.

It wasn’t a bad legislative strategy, per se. The March deadline would have ensured that Schumer and McConnell could not hogtie Trump via omnibus. The SAVE Act combined Republican voters’ two top priorities—immigration and election integrity. 

Johnson made his hand as strong as possible. He created a massive liability for Democrats by getting them on record voting against protecting the election from illegal migrants. And why Johnson wasn’t screaming from the rooftops that Democrats refuse to fund the government through March because they know they deserve to lose the election and that the “momentum” behind their hand-picked nominee in Harris is completely fake, I’ll never know.

For House Republicans seeking reelection, the threat should have been clear: If you vote against this package, you’re telling your constituents you want Trump to lose. It seems Johnson simply wasn’t aggressive enough to get his plan through.

Now he’s promised no Christmas-time omnibus or minibuses. “We have broken the Christmas omni, and I have no intention of going back to that terrible tradition,” Johnson claimed. 

But what if that’s the best thing Republicans could do come December?

For Republicans to consider a December omnibus, November 5 has to be a disaster: President-elect Kamala Harris will have a Democratic House and Senate when inaugurated in January—which, frankly, is a very real possibility just over a month away from Election Day. In this case, the most influence conservatives will have in the first two years of the incoming Harris administration would be in the lame duck session of 2024.

Sure, Johnson would be going back on promises made to his own conference. It wouldn’t be the first time. 

Not long ago, Johnson promised the House would not provide supplemental military aid to Ukraine without real border security. Then Israel was attacked and Republicans in the House demonstrated through their actions—by passing a supplemental military aid bill for Ukraine and Israel—that the war in Israel was a higher priority than securing the southern border. I’ve yet to meet a Republican voter who thinks that Israel funding was a bargaining chip equal to the border.

Johnson should go back on his word again if the political realities change so much that the best way for Republicans to get a victory is to pass a December omnibus.

Yes, the continuing resolution passed Wednesday prolongs the establishment’s chosen spending plan. But whatever Democrats would cook up next conference with Harris at the helm could be a heck of a lot worse.