Two Very Big Stories This Weekend
Author: Greg Valliere
March 22, 2024
THE MARCH MADNESS basketball brackets may take a back seat in this city, as two very big stories dominate Capitol Hill this weekend: passage of a budget deal that, ironically, will hurt Speaker Mike Johnson’s standing in his own party, and the big debate among Donald Trump’s advisers — bankruptcy or no bankruptcy?
FIRST, THE BUDGET: Johnson has outraged a couple dozen right wing House members of the Freedom Caucus, who have finally seen the 2025 budget provisions. They don’t cut spending by anything close to what conservatives want, and they feel the GOP once again has folded under pressure.
JOHNSON HAS BECOME EXASPERATED by the conservatives (of which he once was a member). He wants a deal and feels that a threatened shutdown, unpopular with the public, would hurt the Republicans. So Johnson has opted to bring dozens of Democrats into the process — a tactic that could result in his ouster by angry conservatives.
IF THIS JOHNSON-DEMOCRAT ALLIANCE HOLDS UP, the next move — by early April — would be a deal that grants close to $60 billion in aid to Ukraine, and billions more to Israel, in exchange for more spending to help close the porous border between Texas and Mexico. The pending budget deal this weekend already grants border funding, but more is needed.
A LIKELY BUDGET DEAL this weekend and funding for Ukraine would be enormous victories for Johnson, even though many of his GOP colleagues are fuming. Donald Trump will oppose these deals, but he faces far more important issues in the coming days (see below).
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BANKRUPTCY OR NO BANKRUPTCY: Trump reads his base well, and he knows that a bankruptcy filing would diminish his standing among Republicans who always thought Trump was a mega-billionaire. But he faces a process, beginning on Monday, that could result in the seizure of his properties unless he can come up with nearly a half billion dollars, which he doesn’t have.
SO THE TALK SHOW BUZZ on Sunday will focus on how Trump can avoid the loss of his properties. He will press for a delay and a penalty well below the $464 million sought by relentless New York prosecutors, who want no delay. But a bankruptcy filing by Trump personally or by one of his companies could delay this process for months or years.
TRUMP IS BRILLIANT at dragging out cases, and he has a good chance of delaying his criminal trials for another year or longer. But the civil cases are his worst nightmare — the seizures could begin soon, unless he choses bankruptcy, a process that would move slowly through the courts.
SOME OF HIS AIDES ARE URGING TRUMP to take the bankruptcy path, but this morning’s Washington Post reports that polls show seeking bankruptcy doesn’t play well with Trump’s base.
ON THE OTHER HAND, if New York Attorney General Letitia James starts seizing his properties, he could claim that’s she’s stealing from him. and his base would sympathize. An ugly start to this election could get even uglier within days . . .
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