The House and Senate will be busy this week as they begin to finish out end-of-year legislative items, most notably passage of the FY25 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which is slated for consideration in the House on Wednesday.
After passage of the NDAA, the biggest remaining legislative item to be finalized is a short-term continuing resolution (CR) into March of 2025 that is expected to be broadly “clean” and include supplemental funding to support disaster affected areas. Additional extraneous items remain under negotiation, including outbound investment legislation, but House and Senate Leadership will need to finalize bill text sometime this weekend to ensure passage before the holiday recess.
Off the floor, a number of items will continue to dominate the press, including President-elect Trump’s cabinet nominations and Steering Committee decisions. With respect to the latter, the House Republican Steering Committee met today on all non-contested chairmanships for the 119th Congress, including the selection of Representative Brian Babin (TX) to succeed term-limited Chairman Frank Lucas (OK) at the Science, Space, and Technology Committee.
In addition, the House Republican Steering Committee made recommendations for two contested chairmanships: Foreign Affairs and Energy & Commerce.
First, Representative Brian Mast (FL) prevailed in a four-way race to lead the Foreign Affairs panel, besting fellow Representatives Ann Wagner (MO), Joe Wilson (SC), and Darell Issa (CA) for the post. An Army veteran and Ukraine skeptic, Mast’s victory was viewed as a surprise in some circles given other candidates’ closer proximity to leadership. Numerous sources inside the meeting, however, pointed to Mast’s compelling presentation as the deciding reason for his victory, raising the prospect that Speaker Johnson may wield less influence over committee chair decisions than his recent predecessors.
Meanwhile, Representative Brett Guthrie (KY) prevailed over Representative Bob Latta (OH) in a spirited contest to lead the powerful Energy & Commerce Committee. A healthcare expert and former businessman, Guthrie replaces retiring Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (WA) and will be heavily involved in House Republicans’ efforts to target select provisions of President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act via reconciliation.
On Thursday, the Steering Committee will meet to decide the remaining contested chairmanships, most notably Education and the Workforce and Financial Services. On Friday, the Steering Committee will begin to determine “A committee” assignments for House Republicans. Remaining committee assignments, including those for the freshman class, will likely not be decided until January.
As a reminder, we recently sent out our memo on chairmanship races and committee assignments, which can be found via this link. Please contact us with any specific questions. Thank you!
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