New No. 2 House appropriator: Reconciliation bill going to be ‘heavy lift’
In a sit down with Breaking Defense, Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart discussed getting the FY25 budget sorted, giving the Pentagon more flexibility, and reforming foreign aid.
By Aaron Mehta
on January 17, 2025 at 2:16 PM
WASHINGTON — On Wednesday Florida Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart was named the new vice chairman of the House appropriations committee, putting him in a key position to sort out how to both get the fiscal 2025 budget out of limbo and work out a major reconciliation package backed by President-elect Donald Trump.
Those are challenges, he admitted to Breaking Defense in an interview earlier in the week, that are going to require a lot of finessing.
“Our margins are so slim that it is going to be a very, very heavy lift,” the 11-term congressman said of the slight Republican advantage in the House, “and there are a number of people who have a history of voting against a bill, not because of what’s in it, but because of what potentially is not in it. And that’s a very difficult individual to satisfy, because there’s always something that’s not there that we want, right?
https://breakingdefense.com/2025/01/new-no-2-house-appropriator-reconciliation-bill-going-to-be-heavy-lift/
