By Issues & Insights Editorial Board | May 05, 2025
In the time that President Donald Trump has issued more than 140 executive orders, what has Congress been doing? Anyone?… Anyone? Next to nothing. So far, it has managed to send just five bills to Trump’s desk for signature, a slower pace than any Congress in modern times.
Five. And none of them delivered on Trump’s agenda.
One was the non-controversial Laken Riley Act, which passed by large margins in both chambers.
Another was a continuing resolution to keep the government from shutting down, which was needed only because Congress failed to do its job of passing appropriations bills, like it’s supposed to.
The other three were bills blocking last-minute Biden regulations from going into effect, one of which would have required oil and natural gas producers to map the ocean floor in search of shipwrecks before they start drilling. Not exactly “Golden Age” stuff.
But that big, beautiful bill that Trump has been calling for? Well, here’s now NBC News described it last week:
Republicans are already hitting some snags as they begin the work of crafting a bill for President Donald Trump’s sweeping domestic policy agenda. And they haven’t even made some of their hardest decisions yet.
Begin the work? It’s May, and they are just beginning the work of crafting this bill? And Republicans in the House say getting a reconciliation bill to the Senate is unlikely to happen before Memorial Day?
“Three months into the most energetic administration since Andrew Jackson, Congress is doing nothing on the economy,” said economist Peter St. Onge. “All this with a Republican Congress elected by voters who vociferously support Trump, Elon, and a wholesale gutting of the federal government.”
Republicans want to blame their narrow majorities in the House and Senate. But in Biden’s first 100 days, Democrats had similarly narrow margins. Yet they managed to get 12 bills to Biden’s desk by this time in 2021, including the mother of all spending bills – the $1.9 trillion “American Rescue Plan” that rescued nothing but supercharged inflation.
That bill, which was a “reconciliation” bill that can bypass a Senate filibuster like the one Republicans are still trying to get finished – hit Biden’s desk on March 11.
Why were Democrats so efficient? Because they were ready on day one to get that massive spending bill over the finish line, and had worked out all the compromises in advance. All they had to do was shove it through procedural hurdles.
For reasons we are at a loss to understand, Republicans didn’t come into town in January with a plan to slash spending, cut taxes, finance border security, or do much of anything. They didn’t have an agreement in advance on key issues. Rep. Jason Smith, R-Mo., who chairs the House Ways and Means Committee, said Sunday that Republicans might let some of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts expire to avoid having to cut so much spending.
Worse, when it comes to spending cuts, they appear to be way too focused on keeping their hold on the House and Senate in next year’s midterm elections.
When Democrats controlled Congress at the start of Bill Clinton’s, Barack Obama’s, and Biden’s administrations, they cast votes on tax hikes, Obamacare, and Biden’s massive spending splurge – with no GOP support – knowing those votes would likely cost them their majorities in either the House or Senate. But they were smart enough to know that once you get a law on the books, it’s nearly impossible to get it off, and that they’d eventually regain control of Congress.
So, Clinton’s tax hikes paved the way for more tax hikes. Obamacare is still the law of the land. And even Republicans are acting squeamish about Trump’s plan to simply cut domestic spending back to where it was before COVID, while wetting themselves over changes that would do the same for Medicaid.
Every day that Republicans dawdle increases the odds that they will fail to get a good tax and spending cut bill across the finish line. Every delay causes more anxiety among businesses and consumers. Every misstep gives Democrats more time to rearm.
Trump needs to stop wasting time talking about annexing Canada and start putting some serious pressure on lawmakers to get off their keisters and do their jobs. Before it’s too late.
Issues & Insights was founded by seasoned journalists of the IBD Editorials page. Our mission is to provide timely, fact-based reporting and deeply informed analysis on the news of the day – without fear or favor.
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