When Republicans take over the House majority next week, they’ll be focusing their attention — and legislative business — on Internal Revenue Service (IRS) funding, immigration, energy production, abortion, and crime.
On Friday (December 30), the incoming Republican House majority leader, Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA.), announced three resolutions and a slate of eight bills the GOP caucus would be tackling in the first two weeks of the 118th Congress.
In a letter to his colleagues, Scalise pointed to Republicans winning the House majority in the midterms and equated that to voters deciding “it was time for a new direction.”
Scalise then listed the struggles of “hard-working families,” highlighting that in the last two years, the American people have had to contend with “drastic increases in the cost of living,” “violent crime skyrocketing in… communities,” skyrocketing gas and home heating prices and the migrant crisis escalating on the Southern Border.
He then pledged that Republicans would be focusing on resolving those issues with legislation intervention in the new Congress.
Despite the pledge to pass bills in the House, the GOP’s legislative initiatives are unlikely to pass in the Democratic-controlled Senate, reducing the fervor the GOP is displaying about bills to nothing more than messaging.
In September, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA.) revealed that with the majority, Republicans would first rescind a boost to the IRS funding that passed with the Democrat’s House and Senate Majority Inflation Reduction Act in August.
Republicans have falsely asserted that the additional funding would authorize 87,000 new IRS agents, not taking into consideration that these estimates would include support staff and non-agent IRS employees.
