The director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russ Vought, was recently quoted saying that “the appropriations process has to be less bipartisan.”
While it’s easy to think this would lead to less of the frustrating gridlock that can overtake the budgetary process, Vought is both procedurally and substantively wrong: The answer is more bipartisanship.
If this sounds naïve, consider the alternative.
The first and most obvious issue is realism. Thanks to the Senate filibuster, 60 votes are required to invoke cloture and end debate before proceeding to a final vote on legislation. With only 53 Republicans in the Senate, it’s easy for Democrats to grind things to a halt, and vice-versa under Democratic majorities.
Unless Vought is implicitly calling for an end to the filibuster — an unlikely event, though Trump has argued for it in the past — expecting government funding bills to be passed without a large, messy bipartisan effort is fanciful thinking.
Presumably, Vought wants to make it easier to pass spending cuts such as the recent $9 billion rescissions package. The recissions process is notably exempted from the filibuster, meaning only a simple majority is required to rescind money which was previously appropriated (most likely with some degree of bipartisan support).
We shouldn’t scoff at those savings, but any frustration on Vought’s part is understandable. $9 billion doesn’t correct our budget problem. But going after the rest of appropriations won’t, either. Last year, we spent $1.81 trillion on discretionary spending — the portion of the budget subject to appropriations — while the entire budget deficit was $1.83 trillion.
Instead, we must fix mandatory spending programs — such as Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid — that are on autopilot outside of the appropriations process. But President Trump has repeatedly said these are off-limits.
So, sure, we got $9 billion rescinded on a partisan basis. We also got $1.1 trillion in partisan spending cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, a win for fiscal responsibility greatly overshadowed by $4.5 trillion in lost revenue.
Indeed, as the act just illustrated, Vought’s preferred partisan approach will fail to meaningfully fix our fiscal woes.
That’s because every large-scale partisan reform invites partisan opposition. For years, Democrats attacked Republicans over the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, deriding it as a giveaway to the rich. Republicans returned the favor in 2021 and 2022, relentlessly hammering Democrats for the American Rescue Plan and Inflation Reduction Act, respectively.
Now it’s the Democrats’ turn again with the “big, beautiful, bill,”,with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) recently stating that it would “rip healthcare away … and steal food from the mouths of hungry children, seniors, and veterans.” That’s a strong statement about a bill that only cuts noninterest spending by about 1.5 percent over the decade.
To be clear, holding politicians accountable for their voting record is essential. But this partisan cycle encourages politicians to accentuate policy differences — which are then used against incumbents during elections — rather than find areas of agreement.
Taking away the filibuster or other processes that frustrate the party in power would turn political whiplash into even greater policy whiplash. Already, Republicans have repealed about $500 billion in IRA green tax credits to help finance the recently passed spending bill.
For years, they tried to repeal the Affordable Care Act. And it’s especially apparent in the back-and-forth we see in regulations and executive orders, with recent administrations immediately seeking to undo the actions of its predecessor.
That puts any one-party reforms, regardless of how essential, at risk of being reversed.
Even after considering the political blowback and fickleness of partisan reforms, some may dismiss fiscal bipartisanship as unrealistic. After all, Democrats only care about the Green New Deal while Republicans just want to enrich their wealthy donors, or so we’re told.
Setting these and other tropes aside, there are multiple bipartisan groups in Congress calling for fiscal responsibility and addressing the national debt. Each member of these groups holds different views on how spending should be reduced or revenue increased, but there is clearly a willingness to have those debates.
Embracing bipartisanship, rather than lamenting it as so many have done, would bring common ground to the forefront in a way that’s been missing.
And so, while some will blame a lack of willpower for our fiscal situation, I blame the partisan approach that’s been failing lately. It forces politicians more often into choosing between what they believe is right or what gives them the best chance for reelection.
Americans deserve better. Let’s brush aside the political barriers preventing bipartisanship and work towards our common objectives once again.
Joshua Rowley is a Gibbs Scholar and research fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. He formerly worked as an economist for the House Budget Committee.
