Biden threatens to veto Republican spending bills

The White House on Monday signaled President Joe Biden would veto a pair of Republican-backed appropriations bills that impose steep budget cuts on federal agencies.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has sought to pass 12 separate appropriations bills rather than draft an omnibus spending package to set spending levels for the upcoming year. Two of those measures have attracted the president's ire, which collectively fund the Departments of the Interior, Transportation, Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and their related agencies. Both are expected to face votes in the lower chamber this week, according to The Hill.

The White House outlined its objections in two Statements of Administration Policy, both of which criticized House Republicans for seeking greater spending cuts than those arranged in an agreement made between the White House and then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in May, saying the "Administration negotiated in good faith with House Republican Leadership on bipartisan legislation to avoid a first-ever default and protect the Nation’s hard-earned and historic economic recovery."

Conservative frustrations with the spending limits set in the resulting Fiscal Responsibility Act partially motivated their ouster of McCarthy earlier in October. The new House Speaker, Mike Johnson, has vowed to pursue aggressive spending targets. The proposed bills would cut $3.9 billion from the Environmental Protection Agency, $7 billion from the Department of Transportation, and $1.2 billion from HUD.

"House Republicans had an opportunity to engage in a productive, bipartisan appropriations process, but instead are wasting time with partisan bills that cut domestic spending to levels well below the FRA agreement and endanger critical services for the American people," the White House stated.

Both statements further excoriated the draft bills for including "partisan policy provisions with devastating consequences including harming access to reproductive healthcare, threatening the health and safety of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and Intersex (LGBTQI+) Americans, endangering marriage equality, hindering critical climate change initiatives, and preventing the Administration from promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion."

While neither bill is likely to clear the Democratic Senate, the veto threats mark the latest turn in what is likely to be a particularly tense budget battle ahead of the November deadline to avert a government shutdown. Thus far, Johnson has signaled particular interest toward budgetary matters, recently attaching matching cuts to the IRS to a proposed $14.3 billion aid package to offset the cost. That proposal, too, is expected to meet with Democratic pushback.

Ben Whedon is an editor and reporter for Just the News. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter.