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Senate Budget Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., talks with reporters as he arrives at the U.S. Capitol on Feb. 20, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON — U.S. senators voted early Friday to approve a budget resolution that Republicans hoped would get them one step closer to passing core elements of their agenda, including boosted immigration enforcement.
But the resolution may serve as more of a back-up plan due to an ongoing dispute between the House and Senate.
The 52-48 vote came after senators debated dozens of amendments as part of the vote-a-rama process that began Thursday evening and continued overnight. Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul was the sole Republican to vote against approving the budget resolution, along with all Democrats and independents.
Senate Budget Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said during debate that he wished House GOP leaders the best of luck passing their own budget resolution, but didn’t provide details about how the two chambers might work out an eventual agreement.
The House is expected to vote on its budget resolution next week after the chamber returns from its one-week recess on Monday.
“To my House colleagues, I prefer one big, beautiful bill that makes the tax cuts permanent, that does the things we need to do on the border and with our military and cuts spending. I wish you all the best. I prefer what you’re doing to what we’re doing,” Graham said. “But we’ve got to have a Plan B if you can’t get it done soon.”
Budget process underway
Both chambers of Congress must vote to adopt the same budget resolution in order to unlock the complicated budget reconciliation process the GOP plans to use to pass legislation increasing defense and border security funding by hundreds of billions of dollars, overhauling energy policy and extending the 2017 GOP tax law.
The Senate’s budget resolution proposes that lawmakers pass legislation addressing the first three issues before moving a separate bill later this year addressing tax law. Congress would need to adopt a second budget resolution with reconciliation instructions for the tax piece, under the Senate plan.
House GOP leaders want to pass all of the proposals in one bill and President Donald Trump endorsed that path earlier this week, before posting on social media Thursday evening that the Senate’s two-bill plan was “greatly appreciated.”
“Thank you to Majority Leader John Thune, and the Republican Senate, for working so hard on funding the Trump Border Agenda,” Trump wrote. “We are setting records, the likes of which have never been seen before, on stopping criminal illegals aliens from entering our Country.
“Put simply, we are delivering for the American People, far faster and, more successfully, than anyone thought possible. Your work on funding this effort is greatly appreciated!”
Not adopting one budget resolution would end Republicans’ plans of passing changes to policy without Democratic votes in Congress and curtail a significant portion of the agenda GOP politicians campaigned on.
ICE in need of cash
Graham said during his floor speech the Senate is moving forward now because Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, needs additional money for deportations and detention beds.
“This is a big deal, folks. The Republican Party is going to go all in on border security,” Graham said. “We’re going to upgrade our defense capability, and we’re going to pay for it.”
Graham explained during his speech that the budget resolution wouldn’t actually provide any money toward Republicans’ policy plans, but would send instructions to the committees so they could draft their bills later this year.
Those reconciliation instructions, Graham said, would allow committees to spend up to $175 billion for border security initiatives, including finishing the border wall that Trump started during his first term.
Another $150 billion would go to the Pentagon to bolster various defense capabilities. Graham said where exactly to spend that money would be up to the Armed Services Committee, though he suggested modernizing nuclear weapons and purchasing other weaponry.
Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., raised concerns about what government programs Republicans may cut funding for in order to pay for the new spending on defense, the border and eventually tax breaks.
“Republicans are going down this partisan path because they know Democrats are not going to join them in throwing Medicaid, nutrition assistance and veterans benefits into the wood chopper, so they can throw more tax cuts at billionaires and the biggest corporations,” Murray said.