Hill Republicans say funding deal reached, but Johnson’s dealmaking with Democrats stirs anger among conservatives

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By Sarah Ferris, Lauren Fox and Clare Foran

Washington (CNN) — Congressional Republican leaders have informed their members that they’ve reached a deal on government funding, with staffers now racing to finalize hundreds of pages of text, according to four GOP sources.

But House Speaker Mike Johnson’s late-December dealmaking with Democrats is stirring intense anger across his GOP conference, just days before a government spending deadline and weeks before the pivotal vote the Louisiana Republican needs to win to keep his gavel.

The deal is expected to extend funding into March, averting a shutdown this year and setting up a spending showdown in the early days of the Trump administration.

The deal — which Johnson told CNN he hopes to release Tuesday afternoon — involves nearly $100 billion in disaster aid and $10 billion in relief for farmers in rural communities, those sources said.

It also includes a one-year extension of the farm bill, a provision benefiting biofuels and two major health measures: one extending telehealth flexibilities and another targeting pharmacy benefit managers, according to a person familiar with the discussions.

The aid for farmers is different from the disaster aid package that is expected to be included in the bill. That package, sources say, is largely finished and will total just shy of $100 billion.

It’s unclear when the House would vote on the plan, but leaders of both parties are confident they will avert a government shutdown ahead of Friday night’s deadline.

But multiple House conservatives said Tuesday they feared Johnson and GOP negotiators have ceded too many Democratic demands — resulting in the kind of massive year-end package that Johnson has promised he’d avoid.

“It is a total dumpster fire,” said Republican Rep. Eric Burlison of Missouri, voicing his frustrations at Johnson, whom he wouldn’t commit to backing on the floor in January.

Their anger is largely symbolic since most of those conservatives routinely oppose spending deals on the floor. But conservatives are sending an early warning to Johnson, suggesting this week’s funding fight could determine the speaker’s fate in that leadership vote.

“We’ll see. Everything’s got consequences,” said Rep. Ralph Norman of South Carolina, when asked if the funding bill would impact his support for Johnson next month.

In recent days, Johnson and his allies have spent hours trying to keep conservatives on his side as negotiations continue. Johnson sat down with the House Freedom Caucus at their weekly meeting on Monday night as he detailed some of the spending conversations and worked to head off a conservative rebellion.

Rep. Byron Donalds, who attended that meeting, said members still want to see the text of the deal: “We got a lot of questions.”

“A deal put together like this, the number one question is, ‘What did the other side get?’” Donalds said.

Aid for farmers

Negotiators had hoped to finalize the government funding deal over the weekend, but last-minute hang-ups emerged, pushing congressional action closer to Friday’s deadline.

A fight over aid for farmers vexed negotiators over the weekend with Republicans desperate to include additional funds in the end-of-year spending deal and Democrats continuing to make demands in exchange for the ask.

Asked if the farm aid could wait until 2025, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise told CNN, “There’s the potential for a lot of foreclosures to happen by the end of this year, so it’s an imminent threat that has to be addressed before the end of the year if we’re going to maintain family farms across America.”

Republican Rep. Frank Lucas of Oklahoma, the former chairman of the House Agriculture Committee, said, “From the perspective of the political crowd, of course, rural America is and has been for a long time Republican, so this conference has a responsibility to address those needs, not just because of the political base but because those farmers feed the United States and the world.”

GOP Rep. Chip Roy of Texas argued that Republicans should have forced Democrats to vote down farm aid on the House floor and not offered any sweeteners in exchange.

“If I was doing this, I would make Democrats vote down farm aid,” Roy said. “Put it on the floor, actually go down and legislate … So instead, we get this negotiated crap and we’re forced to eat this crap sandwich - why? Because fricking Christmas is right around the corner. It’s the same dang thing every year, legislate by crisis, legislate by calendar, not legislate because it’s the right thing to do.”

This story and headline have been updated with additional developments.

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