If you ask House Republicans, the most reviled phrase in leadership’s vocabulary is “continuing resolution.” Nothing seems to raise conservatives’ blood pressure like a CR — mainly because it’s become synonymous with Congress’s perpetual failure to pass a long-term budget. And while there’s certainly grumbling about the idea this time around, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) may be heading into his seventh government shutdown threat with less resistance from his own party. And another two words explain why: Donald Trump.

With a handful of days until the clock runs out on another government funding deadline, no one’s been working the phones harder than the president. Together with Johnson, the White House has been doing everything it can to hold the fragile party together long enough to keep the lights on in Washington, D.C. When House leaders released the text of a 99-page funding extension that would give appropriators another six months to hammer out the budget in regular order, Trump was the first to rally the troops.

“The House and Senate have put together, under the circumstances, a very good funding Bill (‘CR’)!” he insisted on Truth Social Saturday. “All Republicans should vote (Please!) YES next week. Great things are coming for America,” Trump promised, “and I am asking you all to give us a few months to get us through to September so we can continue to put the Country’s ‘financial house’ in order. Democrats will do anything they can to shut down our Government, and we can’t let that happen. We have to remain UNITED — NO DISSENT — Fight for another day when the timing is right…”

The message to conservative rabble-rousers was clear: get on board and give us room to hammer out the reforms you want for the next fiscal year. Adding to the usual drama, Johnson can only afford to lose one vote on the CR with the current 218-214 margin — giving him almost zero space to maneuver if any Republicans go rogue. To sweeten the post for conservatives who complain that this bill would keep the government spending at Joe Biden’s levels, negotiators did manage to slash $13 billion in nondefense spending, boosted veterans’ health care, and found more dollars for defense. Despite the Democrats’ desperate claims to the contrary, Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare would remain untouched.

Incredibly, House Freedom Caucus members, who are the most likely to upend Johnson’s apple cart, seemed a little more subdued in their criticism. That may be thanks, Rep. Michael Cloud (R-Texas) pointed out, to the group’s meeting with Trump last week.

“I’m certainly no fan of CRs myself,” he told “Washington Watch” guest host and former Congressman Jody Hice Friday. “The whole notion of Congress continuing to kick the can down the road, so to speak, is very troubling. And considering that this originally started as a budget under the Biden administration could give one pause. But,” he explained, “as we look to where we’re going, there’s a couple of things at play here. One is [that] DOGE is doing some great work to uncover the waste, fraud, abuse, [and] corruption that is happening in our federal government right now. But there’s a lot more work to be done,” he acknowledged, “and we need to give them a little bit of time to finish the work so that we can take the lessons learned, the savings [can] be found for the American people, and [we can] work that into the appropriations process. And so, in the meantime, we’ve got to keep the federal government running.”

His colleague, Rep. Stephanie Bice (R-Okla.) toed that same line with Family Research Council President Tony Perkins on Monday’s show, insisting that the only people who might profit from a prolonged fight are Democrats. “I think the key here is that we’re avoiding a government shutdown, because really, all a government shutdown is, is a distraction from getting our important work done, which President Trump has said is securing our southern border, protecting our national security interests, and reining in spending,” she underscored. “And although we don’t have the opportunity to make some of the cuts that we would like to in a full appropriations package, this holds spending flat and gives some flexibility to agencies to be able to move money around.”

After Congress gets the next six months squared away in the CR, “we will immediately go into the FY 26 appropriations process,” Bice vowed, despite the fact that the budget hasn’t been done in regular order for about 20 years. “That’s going to be quite significant,” Perkins chimed in, “if Congress is able to move through the normal appropriations process.”

But, as a growing number of senators are starting to point out, there’s another way to hack through the thick growth of government waste and fraud that Elon Musk has uncovered — and a lot sooner than October. It’s a process called rescission, a powerful — but sparsely used — weapon that Trump can use to claw back billions of dollars of spending Congress has already approved.

Thanks to the Impoundment Control Act of 1974, presidents can permanently cancel funding to executive agencies if it’s within a 45-day window and if a simple majority of Congress approves. As the Congressional Institute outlines, “The President begins the process by sending both [c]hambers of Congress a message indicating how much money he thinks should be cut; what agency and project the money was for; why it should not be spent; how withholding the money will affect fiscal policy, the economy, and the program it was intended for; and ‘all facts, circumstances, and considerations relating to or bearing upon the proposed rescission.’”

While it’s hardly an obscure rule (Ronald Reagan proposed 133 rescissions), recent presidents haven’t really pursued the idea — with the exception of Trump who tried to roll back pieces of a massive omnibus in 2018 only to be blocked by the Senate.

The beauty of the rescission process is that Congress can fast-track it. Unlike normal spending bills, the proposal would bypass the 60-vote majority in the Senate. Using Musk’s recommendations as a guide, the president could zero in on hundreds of unnecessary, woke, and obsolete programs or positions to bulldoze. It would also help insulate the administration from the flurry of legal challenges to the string of cuts the president has already made. “You know, if we lose in court … we’re bound by it,” Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) warned after a GOP lunch with Musk Wednesday. “You have rescission and reconciliation. … Take these two tools and use them.”

From a messaging standpoint, Democrats would have a much harder time landing their blows on the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) if the GOP handles the reforms legislatively. “What we’ve got to do as Republicans is capture their work product, put it in a bill and vote on it,” Graham argued. “So the White House, I’m urging them to come up with a rescission package.”

Even Musk himself wasn’t aware of this option to chip away at runaway spending and raised his arms triumphantly in the air when Republican senators explained it to him, Graham recounted. “[I]t’s time for the White House now to go on offense. We’re losing altitude here,” the senator declared. “… And the way you can regain altitude is to take the work product, get away from the personalities and the drama, take the work product and vote on it.”

As the editors of National Review write in support, “A successful effort would likely involve Elon Musk in his capacity as public spokesman for DOGE, making it clear to Republicans that a vote for the rescission package is a vote for cleaning up wasteful spending. The package should also be crafted by the White House with congressional input, so that Republicans know they’ll be receiving something they can all vote for.”

It’s also, they continue, “one way to ensure that DOGE-inspired spending cuts pass legal muster.” Not to mention that it would “bring some order to what has been at times a chaotic and undisciplined effort. Requiring the president to list the items he’d like to see cut in a statement that Congress can then take up and approve with a roll call vote would help make clear to the American people what DOGE is doing and give Republican members of Congress buy-in to tell their constituents they did something to cut spending.”

Obviously, the editors caution, “The rescission process is not going to come anywhere close to balancing the budget or changing the long-run trajectory of the federal debt burden. That will still require entitlement reform and spending cuts enacted through the appropriations process. But when DOGE finds dumb spending to eliminate, the president should put together a rescission package, and the speaker and Senate majority leader should work to pass it as soon as they can,” they urge. “A little spring cleaning of the budget wouldn’t hurt.”

AUTHOR

Suzanne Bowdey

Suzanne Bowdey serves as editorial director and senior writer at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2025 Family Research Council.

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